Twice during the current legislative session, Senate President Page Cortez has taken extraordinary steps to help certain gambling companies that are represented by a former colleague who is close to Cortez - and is also the former mayor of Lafayette - our media partners at The Advocate report.
The friend, Joel Robideaux, became a lobbyist this past year after a 15-year run as a public official, a career that ended after he didn’t seek re-election as mayor of the city and parish of Lafayette in 2019. Before that, he spent 11 years in the state House, the story states.
Robideaux’s wins as a novice lobbyist owe largely to actions by Cortez, who is probably the most powerful state legislator. Robideaux’s three primary clients -- who pay him somewhere between $200,000 and $450,000 altogether, according to state filings -- have all notched major wins during the session, which ends Thursday, the Advocate reports.
To read The Advocate's whole story, click here.