By Dustin Granger / Reader-submitted opinion
Louisiana has a long history of officials cutting deals with private interests at the public’s expense. During the oil and gas boom, the state left severance tax revenue on the table while enforcement gaps let industry pollute our air, water, and land for decades. Governor Jeff Landry has accelerated that pattern faster than any of his predecessors. He installed an unqualified Secretary of Environmental Quality, then reorganized the Department of Natural Resources into something even statehouse reporters can’t fully explain. This year the legislature signed off on tax breaks and NDAs for AI data centers, keeping voters in the dark about what those companies are getting and what they’re using.
Now it’s SpaceX’s turn, and it’s the biggest giveaway yet.
The Landry administration is negotiating to hand over roughly 130,000 acres on Pecan Island, in Vermilion Parish, for a rocket blast pad, not a research facility, the kind Boca Chica, Texas is still fighting over. That land is reportedly tied to Exxon’s punishment, part of a coastal damages settlement for decades of polluting our marshes, though the settlement itself is sealed by court order. If that reporting holds up, instead of restoring the land, the state is routing it straight to Elon Musk.
Pecan Island is about the worst possible place for this. The coast there has been sinking and washing away for decades, and hurricanes are speeding it up. The site borders two wildlife refuges and some of the best hunting and fishing water left in this state, the kind “Sportsman’s Paradise” was supposed to protect. If this goes through, we can stop pretending coastal restoration is a real priority in Louisiana.
The legislature already greased the wheels this session, passing tax breaks and liability shields for unnamed “aerospace” companies and exempting them from public records requests. So, when something goes wrong, and something eventually will, Louisianans may not have the right to sue, and may not even have the right to know. Now Trump’s FAA wants to waive thirteen federal environmental and health laws, including the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act, so Musk doesn’t have to deal with “regulatory burden.”
We don’t even know the full extent of what Musk stands to gain. We know the eligibility thresholds in the tax break bills, not the actual value of what’s being handed over. Given how this Republican-controlled legislature has handled every other corporate giveaway this year, there’s little reason to think this deal is any different.
Local officials keep telling us we must accept this to “compete.” I don’t buy it. A state that can only land these deals by throwing out the rule of law and hiding negotiations behind NDAs is giving Louisiana away, one 130,000-acre parcel at a time.
Most Louisianans haven’t been told what this deal actually involves. That’s worth being angry about. Ask your legislators what they voted for this spring, and whether they’ll say so publicly.