SUMMARY: A new insurance company, Patriot Select Property and Casualty Insurance, has entered the Florida market just before hurricane season, becoming the 12th company to do so since recent legislative reforms aimed at improving the industry. Florida’s Insurance Information Institute spokesman, Mark Friedlander, noted this expansion could lead to lower rates for consumers, with reports of reductions up to 50% on premiums. Founded by industry veterans with nearly $30 million in capital, Patriot Select aims to stabilize the previously unstable Florida insurance market, where many customers faced non-renewals. Consumers are encouraged to review their coverage annually for better options.

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by Bobbi-Jean Misick, Verite, Louisiana Illuminator
April 20, 2025

NEW ORLEANS – Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill is pushing forward with her efforts to force Orleans Parish Sheriff Susan Hutson to drop a longtime policy that generally prohibits deputies from directly engaging in federal immigration enforcement within the city’s jail.

In legal filings, Murrill claims the policy — which the state characterizes as a so-called “sanctuary city” policy —  is in direct conflict with a newly passed state law that requires state and local law enforcement agencies to cooperate with federal immigration agencies.

“The consent decree now sits fundamentally at odds with state law as applicable to immigration detainers,” Murrill said in court documents filed Friday (April 11).

A federal court will now determine whether to allow the state of Louisiana to join a 2011 federal suit that resulted in the policy and whether to throw out the policy altogether. A hearing has been set for April 30.

The state’s campaign against “sanctuary” policies comes as President Donald Trump is pushing local law enforcement agencies to join the federal government in his promised immigration crackdown. Since his inauguration, Trump has ordered the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to push for more partnerships between local law enforcement units and federal immigration agencies. A few have already signed up. Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry, a longtime immigration hardliner and Trump ally, has worked with Republican lawmakers in the state to enact laws that encourage those collaborations.

As attorney general, Landry criticized a policy adopted by the New Orleans Police Department, under a long-running federal consent decree that blocks officers from enforcing immigration laws.

Neither Murrill’s office nor representatives for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement responded to requests for comment.

In court filings, Murrill said Hutson “does not oppose the [state’s] intervention” in the case.” But a spokesperson for Hutson said that’s not exactly true.

“It’s more accurate that we take no position regarding the state intervention,” a Sheriff’s Office spokesperson said in an emailed statement on Wednesday.

While she has not taken a position for or against increased collaboration with ICE, in an interview with Fox 8 in December, Hutson noted that the jail’s resources were far too stretched to take on immigration enforcement.

“I’m a lawyer. I believe in following the law and court orders and we do that and so that’s what we’re gonna do, continue to follow the law, but I cannot do ICE’s work,” she said. “It’s too big of a load.”

Potential conflict

The sheriff’s policy stems from a 2013 federal court settlement in a civil rights case involving two New Orleans construction workers picked up on minor charges in 2009 and 2010.

Mario Cacho and Antonio Ocampo sued after they were allegedly illegally held in the city’s jail past the completion of their sentences. The two were held at the request of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The agency issues such “detainer” requests to local law enforcement agencies, asking them to hold onto arrestees who are suspected of immigration violations.

Local agencies are only supposed to honor the hold requests for 48 hours, after which they should let detainees free. But in 2009 and 2010, then-Sheriff Marlin Gusman detained Cacho and Ocampo for months, according to legal filings in their case against the office.

Ocampo and Cacho settled the case with the Sheriff’s Office in 2013, and Gusman agreed to adopt a new policy on immigration investigations. The resulting policy blocks the agency from investigating immigration violations and from detaining immigrants for ICE without a court order, except in certain cases where they are facing charges for a small number of serious violent crimes.

Attorneys for Cacho and Ocampo declined to speak with Verite News on the record. However, filings they submitted to the court last week opposing the state’s intervention in the case argue  that Murrill has “blatantly misrepresented the OPSO policy” by falsely claiming it forces the Sheriff’s Office to disregard all ICE detainers.

The sheriff’s office, like the NOPD, has been under a sweeping federal consent decree for more than a decade. But unlike the NOPD, the jail’s consent decree does not demand that deputies stay away from federal immigration enforcement, only that it release anyone subject to an immigration hold after two days. The Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, which is a party to both consent decrees, has not entered any filings since Murrill moved to bring the state into the Cacho and Ocampo case.

The Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment.

The OPSO policy remained in place for more than a decade without any controversy until last spring, when the Louisiana Legislature passed a bill — Act 314 — that blocks so-called “sanctuary” policies prohibiting state and local law enforcement officers from cooperating with federal immigration agencies like ICE.

A sheriff’s office spokesperson spokesperson said the agency’s policy on ICE detainers is “governed” by the consent judgement in the case. She declined to comment further, as the state is currently challenging the policy, but affirmed that OPSO is “in full compliance with all applicable state laws and valid court orders related to ICE detainers.”

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by Emma Murphy, Oklahoma Voice, Arkansas Advocate
April 20, 2025

OKLAHOMA CITY — On the 30th anniversary of the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history, former President Bill Clinton said Americans must unite despite their differences, and that Oklahomans can help lead the way by serving as that role model for the rest of the nation.

Clinton, who was president at the time of the attack, returned to the site of the 1995 Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building bombing Saturday to deliver the keynote address to a crowd of over 1,600 that attended to remember and honor those who died and were injured in the attack.

While the event is typically held outdoors at the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum, the site of the bombing, it was moved indoors due to inclement weather. The crowd that arrived to commemorate the anniversary was so large that once the pews were packed, people stood along the walls and filled an overflow room.

“The domestic terrorists who did this awful thing believed that it would spark a nationwide upheaval against the American government, and would eventually destroy our government, our democracy and our life,” Clinton said. “Instead, you gave them, as the mayor said so eloquently, the Oklahoma Standard. You gave them service, honor and kindness.”

Clinton, a Democrat, came to Oklahoma City days after the 1995 attack to address a devastated crowd assembled at the Oklahoma State Fair Arena. He said he’s returned to Oklahoma City in subsequent years to commemorate the event.

Three decades later, Clinton said that the country has again grown more polarized. When Oklahoma City was the “center of polarization” 30 years ago, it chose to move forward together, he said.

“America needs you, and America needs the Oklahoma Standard,” Clinton said. “And if we all live by it, we would get a fairer economy, a more stable society. We would understand one another, and we wouldn’t feel weak if we admitted we were wrong about something.”

Thirty years ago, a fertilizer and fuel oil bomb placed inside a Ryder truck outside the Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City exploded at 9:02 a.m., killing 168 people, including 19 children, and injuring around 850.

Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols were arrested for their roles. Both were found guilty. McVeigh was executed June 11, 2001, by lethal injection at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Indiana. Nichols was sentenced to life in prison.

Michael Fortier was sentenced to 12 years in prison for failing to report his knowledge of the bombing plot.

Investigators said McVeigh held extremist views and planned the bombing on the anniversary of the end of the Waco siege between law enforcement and the Branch Davidians.

Other speakers at Saturday’s remembrance event included prominent Republican officials such as Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, former Gov. Frank Keating, and U.S. Sen. James Lankford. Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt also spoke. Most of Oklahoma’s congressional delegation was present, as were a few other former governors, current state lawmakers and other officials.

There have been nearly “11,000 tomorrows” since the bombing and in Oklahoma City, Holt said, and the city has grown in that time. He said 30 years since the bombing signifies a “generation.”

While younger Oklahomans may not remember the bombing, Stitt said, they live in a state shaped by it and the “commitment to service, honor and kindness” that followed.

Lankford said Oklahomans need to ensure the lessons learned from the bombing and its aftermath are passed to future generations to ensure there is “no generation that rises up that does not remember.”

The federal building housed agencies like the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Secret Service, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco,  Firearms and Explosives, the agency that initially launched the Waco raid. But the building also held a day care, military recruitment offices and other various federal agencies.

Family members of victims read the 168 names to the crowd Saturday in an effort to “humanize” the people, said Kari Watkins, president and CEO of the memorial museum.

The building was imploded after the rescue operations and evidence collections were completed. A new federal building was built nearby.

The memorial was built where the old federal building once stood. The 168 chairs erected at the site each represent an empty seat at the dinner table. The smaller chairs represent the children who died. A reflecting pool represents the time between 9:01 a.m. and 9:03 a.m. April 19, 1995. Officials were able to preserve an American elm tree that survived the blast. It is known as the “Survivor Tree.”

In the aftermath of the attack, the state became known for the “Oklahoma Standard,” a term used to describe the “selfless actions” of thousands who offered help.

Reporter Barbara Hoberock contributed to this story. 

Oklahoma Voice is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Oklahoma Voice maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Janelle Stecklein for questions: info@oklahomavoice.com.

Arkansas Advocate is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Arkansas Advocate maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Sonny Albarado for questions: info@arkansasadvocate.com.

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