In the final days of the 2025 legislative session, Louisiana lawmakers had a choice to either offer modest relief to homeowners facing skyrocketing insurance premiums, or protect the status quo. It should come with no surprise that they chose the latter.
Senate Bill 235, authored by Senator Royce Duplessis of New Orleans, would have provided an income tax credit of up to $2,000 for low-income homeowners—specifically, those earning less than 200% of the federal poverty line. For a family of four, that’s $62,400 a year. This was not a sweeping entitlement program. It was a targeted, practical response to a crisis that has left working people unable to afford basic insurance coverage on their homes.
The bill was already watered down before the vote. Lawmakers capped the total amount at $1 million statewide, and added language limiting the credit to the amount of taxes a person actually owes—making it essentially worthless for the poorest Louisianans. Even with these compromises, the House rejected it, 49-52.
The opposition wasn’t about budget concerns. Some Republican lawmakers, like Rep. Raymond Crews, argued the bill would “distort the market” or somehow cause insurance rates to rise. That argument doesn’t stand up to even basic scrutiny. A tax credit for a homeowner doesn’t change how insurers calculate risk. It doesn’t affect reinsurance costs, actuarial tables, or catastrophe models. The $2,000 would have gone directly to the homeowner—not the insurer—and would have done nothing to increase insurer losses or liabilities.
What makes the rejection even more infuriating is the hypocrisy underneath it. The same legislature that balked at giving homeowners $2,000 in relief has already approved tens of millions of dollars in subsidies for the insurance industry itself. Last year, lawmakers revived the Insure Louisiana Incentive Program, allocating $45 million in state grants to lure insurance companies back to the market after Hurricane Ida. These companies were not required to lower premiums—just to write new policies.
At the same time, the state launched the Fortify Homes Program, using public money to fund roof improvements for individual homes. This program, also funded with $45 million, was designed to reduce risk for insurers—not to lower costs for homeowners.
Let’s not forget Louisiana Citizens, the state-run insurer of last resort, which by law must charge above-market rates. When Citizens runs a deficit, all policyholders—regardless of which company they’re with—are hit with a surcharge. In effect, all of us are already subsidizing the failures of the insurance market.
And yet, when it came time to help real people, lawmakers balked. Rep. Mandie Landry of New Orleans, whose own insurance premium has tripled, pointed out the absurdity. “I’m subsidizing the tax credits we did last year on corporations,” she said during the floor debate. “I just find it a little preposterous that there is so much pushback over something so small that does help people try to stay in their homes.”
She’s right. This bill didn’t threaten the market. It threatened the narrative. Because if lawmakers admit that the system is failing—that even working families can’t afford to stay insured—they would have to stop pretending that the free market is taking care of everyone.
But the market isn’t free. It’s already propped up with public money; but, the difference is, that money goes to corporations. The minute it’s directed toward actual residents—toward people who are one storm away from losing everything—it suddenly becomes controversial.
The defeat of SB 235 is a missed opportunity and a signal that Louisiana’s lawmakers will subsidize roofers, underwrite insurers, and write blank checks to the industry—but when it comes to helping the people whose homes are on the line, they hesitate and stall. They say it’s unfair and too expensive. They say it’s dangerous to the market.
And this crisis isn’t hypothetical. It’s already gutting families. In our recent piece, Big Easy Magazine laid out just how bleak the picture has become. Homeowners across the state are facing insurance premiums that now rival their mortgages, with some seeing hikes of 200 to 300% in just one renewal cycle.
One Lake Charles resident saw their premium jump from $2,400 to $7,800 in under two years. In New Orleans, many flood zone homeowners now pay over $6,000 annually just to keep their insurance active.
This isn’t a functioning market. It’s a distorted market — but in favor of corporations, not homeowners. How is it that multi-billion dollar insurance companies can’t compete fairly without the support of big government, but a $2,000 tax credit “distorts” the market?
But what’s really dangerous is a government that continues to protect profit while letting its people drown—financially, and literally. It’s time for us to wake up and see that these Republican legislators don’t support free markets. If they did, they wouldn’t subsidize Big Insurance.
This bill wouldn’t have solved the crisis. But it would have acknowledged it. It would have told the single mom in Lake Charles, the retired couple in New Orleans East, the working family in Lafourche Parish: we see you, and we want to help you stay in your home.
Instead, the legislature sent a very different message. If you’re not a corporation, don’t expect a bailout. If you’re not profitable, you’re not a priority. And if your house blows away in the next storm, don’t look to Baton Rouge for answers.
If you’re a corporation, they’ll throw you millions. If you’re a struggling homeowner, you’re on your own. That’s who Louisiana’s Republican lawmakers really represent.
