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T u e s d ay, d e c e m b e r 2, 2025
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HONORING HISTORY STAFF PHOTO By MICHAEL JOHNSON
LSU football coach Lane Kiffin gives an opening statement at an introductory news conference on Monday at Tiger Stadium.
‘The best job in football’ New coach Kiffin praises opportunity to win at LSU
BY WILSON ALEXANDER Staff writer
As LSU courted Lane Kiffin, athletic director Verge Ausberry sent him a message. Ole Miss had been jumped by Oregon in the College Football Playoff rankings even though it had not played a game, and Ausberry wanted to tease him a little bit. What he said also encapsulated the way LSU sold Kiffin on the job. “Teams don’t jump LSU,” Ausberry said. Kiffin was introduced as LSU’s head coach Monday afternoon inside the club suites overlooking Tiger Stadium, a day after he left an Ole Miss team on the cusp of hosting a first-round game. He is the first head coach to leave a playoff-bound team, and Kiffin felt torn. At one point, he said the only way to describe the decision-making process was that “it sucked.” But Kiffin did leave, taking over a team that went 7-5 this year while he led Ole Miss to its first 11-win regular season in school history. Kiffin saw LSU as one of the premier jobs in college football, a place where he could finally win his first national championship. Kiffin has taken other desirable jobs before, especially at Southern Cal, but he felt ready at 50 years old to make a move that he hopes will define his career. “Somebody very close to me reminded me this week that LSU is the best job in football,” Kiffin said.
ABOVE: Christina Dayries, chief of staff in the Lafayette Parish Mayorpresident’s Office, speaks Monday during a ceremony marking the 70th anniversary of Rosa Parks’ arrest at the Rosa Parks Transportation Center in Lafayette. Parks was arrested in 1955 after she refused to give up her bus seat to a White passenger in Montgomery, Alabama, leading to a Supreme Court ruling that deemed segregation on buses unconstitutional and the furtherance of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. RIGHT: Phyllis Coleman Mouton, president of Women of Wisdom, lays a rose on a city bus seat to honor civil rights icon Rosa Parks during Monday’s ceremony. STAFF PHOTOS By LESLIE WESTBROOK
ä See KIFFIN, page 4A
Landry intervenes in House leadership race
White House says follow-up strike on drug boat lawful
Republicans prepare for caucus chair election
BY AAMER MADHANI and REGINA GARCIA CANO Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The White House said Monday that a Navy admiral acted “within his authority and the law” when he ordered a second, follow-up strike on an alleged drug boat in the Caribbean Sea in a September U.S. military operation that has come under bipartisan scrutiny. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt offered the justification for the Sept. 2 strike after lawmakers from both parties on Sunday announced support for congressional reviews of U.S. military strikes against vessels suspected of smuggling drugs in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific Ocean. The lawmakers cited a published report that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued a verbal order for a
BY TYLER BRIDGES Staff writer
ASSOCIATED PRESS PHOTO By EVAN VUCCI
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks during a news briefing at the White ä See STRIKE, page 4A House on Monday.
WEATHER HIGH 50 LOW 38 PAGE 6A
The election to choose the next chair of the Louisiana House Republican Caucus, normally a littlenoticed piece of inside baseball, is roiling the ranks of the 73-member Republican delegation. That’s because Gov. Jeff Landry, in an unprecedented move, is telling lawmakers he wants them to select Rep. Michael Echols, RMonroe, instead of Rep. John Illg, R-Metairie.
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Numerous House members said Landry’s support for Echols stems from his anger at Illg for taking a stand against the governor’s biggest priority during the 2025 legislative session, a measure that will give Insurance Commissioner Tim Temple more power to reject car insurance rate increases. The bill would allow Landry to blame Temple if insurance rates continue to rise. Landry has already sought retribution against Republicans who opposed him on that measure. As The Advocate | The Times-Picayune reported in July, 16 of the 17 line-item vetoes issued by Landry killed spending projects sponsored
ä See LANDRY, page 5A
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