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Attorney General says grand jury was "weaponized," calls for transparency and investigations
Summary
The Attorney General said a grand-jury indictment in New Orleans amounted to a weaponization of the system, insisted her letters did not amount to a crime, and said her office will pursue public records and subpoenas; both she and the governor called for further investigation.
The Attorney General, speaking at the briefing, said the 16-count indictment that was later dismissed represented a troubling use of the grand-jury process. She told reporters that a group of largely unidentified people in New Orleans "were able to weaponize the grand jury system to indict a sitting attorney general for something that is not a crime."
She defended sending letters that advised city officials about the law, saying "what I did was not a crime" and that the letters were ordinary legal communications. The attorney general said she has issued litigation-preservation letters, has public-records requests pending, and plans to enforce subpoenas and seek records — including communications, emails and text messages — that she said could clarify who was involved. The governor echoed calls for a federal investigation and said lawmakers were discussing returning to consider reforms to New Orleans' criminal court structure.
