Operating capital
As Louisiana restarts executions, stories about the state’s death penalty — from condemned men, victims, families, and those who work in the death chamber.
In this ground, our ancestors were buried.
Our heritage is in this land. We can’t let a multinational corporation desecrate it.
The Louisiana legislature’s plans to cage our future: the March 29 ballot amendments
Early voting for this crucial election starts on Saturday. The four constitutional amendments on the March 29 ballot are designed to mislead you as a voter and stand in the way of a safe, more healthy Louisiana.
All in a Carnival’s Pay
High winds on Mardi Gras Day truncated Rex’s route and kept Zulu from downtown New Orleans, taking a toll on business owners and on local school bands, which went unpaid for Zulu and other weather-affected parades. Then Rex announced that it would pay the bands booked for its parade, raising questions about the history of band payments from krewes – and why those payments matter.
The Lens Carnival Edition 2025
Our reporters stayed on their beats, covering how Carnival affects the way New Orleans works - and doesn't work.
Redemption and the Ultimate Punishment
"I remember feeling a flush of anger that the State of Louisiana was giving Bordelon what he wanted, relief from his guilt," writes the author, who visited Angola with a film crew in 2010 as Louisiana was preparing to execute Gerald Bordelon. "My husband had died a few years before that, leaving me a widow and mother to two small children. Death, for me, was not something a governor should casually enter into with a signature — or that Bordelon could chase, to relieve his personal agony."
Renewable energy could meet the intense appetites of AI data centers. But Entergy is looking to fossil fuels.
Entergy, the Louisiana utility, has dragged its feet on renewables. Now, it seems that a proposed Meta data center in northern Louisiana might instead create an “urgent” push for dirty, fossil-fuel power. To power the center, Entergy will rely mostly on new gas-fired generators - paid for by ratepayers.
Taking in parades together, but apart
New Orleanians maintain certain traditions at Carnival parades. We say hello to strangers, tote wagons and folding chairs and blankets. But along the St. Charles parade route, we most often settle in areas with our people.
Behind the Lens episode 266 Carnival Part I: ‘Throw less, throw better’
Nick Chrastil on how gun laws clash during Carnival, including on the parade route. Delaney Dryfoos on krewes' efforts to make parades greener. And Marta Jewson on high school marching bands — and their budgets.
