Louisiana

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — In a day of dizzying developments, governors across the U.S. sounded a perilous alarm about the rapid spread of the new coronavirus and warned of dire consequences for their health care systems.

The governor of California issued a statewide stay-at-home order, Pennsylvania’s governor ordered more than 150 types of businesses to close, the governor of Texas closed schools for more than 5 million students and the Louisiana governor delivered a grim assessment of his state to President Donald Trump.

Louisiana (AP) --- Roylan Hernandez Diaz’s long journey ended inside a white-walled cell in the solitary confinement wing of a Louisiana prison.

Nearby were the last of his belongings: a tube of toothpaste, a few foam cups, and a sheet of paper explaining how he could request his release from immigration detention. He had already been denied three times.

LAFAYETTE, La. (AP) — The aspiring ‘black metal’ musician who was arrested in a series of fires set at African American churches in Louisiana last spring pleaded guilty Monday to federal and state criminal charges.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office said in a news release that Holden Matthews pleaded guilty to three counts of intentional damage to religious property, a federal hate crime. He also pleaded to one count of using fire to commit a felony. He entered the pleas in federal court in Lafayette. Sentencing on the federal charges is set for May 22.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Officials announced Saturday that no data was held for ransom and that a recovery operation is getting underway after a cyberattack a day earlier triggered a shutdown of city government computers in New Orleans.

Chief Information Officer Kim LaGrue, speaking at a news conference with Mayor LaToya Cantrell and others, said the city hadn’t heard from any hackers or received any demands.

NOLA.com reported that LaGrue described the cyberattack as “minimal” and that officials expect to move quickly to bring computers fully back online.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Ten people were shot and wounded early Sunday near the French Quarter in New Orleans, a popular spot for tourists. Hours later in another part of town, another shooting killed two men and wounded two others.

Police said both shootings remain under investigation, and authorities did not immediately draw any connection between them.

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Odd-year elections in Louisiana, Kentucky and Virginia have let Democrats expand their footprint in Southern states where Republicans dominated not long ago.

Those outcomes hardly predict national 2020 results: President Donald Trump isn’t suddenly at risk of losing Louisiana because Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards got re-elected Saturday. And the story wasn’t all good for Democrats: They came up short in Mississippi, where Republicans won the governorship and picked up the last remaining statewide office that had been held by a Democrat.

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards has stunned Republicans again, narrowly winning a second term Saturday as the Deep South’s only Democratic governor and handing Donald Trump another gubernatorial loss this year.

In the heart of Trump country, the moderate Edwards cobbled together enough cross-party support with his focus on bipartisan, state-specific issues to defeat Republican businessman Eddie Rispone.

BOSSIER CITY, La. (AP) — President Donald Trump said the impeachment probe has been “very hard” on his family, even as he tried to flex his political muscle to flip the governor’s mansion in deep-red Louisiana.

Speaking in friendly territory in a state he carried in 2016 by 20 percentage points, Trump lashed out Thursday at Democratic investigators and what he called a “deranged impeachment witch hunt.” While arguing it was a political boon for his reelection, he acknowledged for the first time a personal toll from the impeachment process that stands to cloud his legacy.

MONROE, La. (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump struck a defiant note on Wednesday at a rally in Louisiana a day after Democrats clinched victories in a raft of local elections that cast a shadow over his 2020 re-election hopes.

Speaking at a packed arena in the city of Monroe, Trump doubled down on his assertion that a House-led impeachment inquiry into his presidency was a hoax and sought to buoy support for Republican businessman Eddie Rispone’s bid for the governorship.

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — The Latest on President Donald Trump’s rally in Louisiana (all times local):

9:30 p.m.

President Donald Trump is talking optimistically about the 2020 elections, despite the warning signs for Republicans that came out of Kentucky, Virginia and elsewhere Tuesday.

Trump is campaigning in Monroe, Louisiana, for a GOP gubernatorial candidate.

He is attacking House Democrats for their impeachment inquiry, saying their “shameful conduct has created an angry majority.”