Rep. Cao Refuses to Support Atlantis Shutdown
Last week, A Community Voice Louisiana — a New Orleans nonprofit — met with Representative Joseph Cao (R-LA) to ask him to shut down BP Atlantis. He refused to take action, leaving other concerned community leaders wondering why their representative is not joining others in Congress who have urgent questions about safety on the rig.
Louisiana Representative Joseph Cao's top donor is a BP crony. Maybe that's why he doesn't support the shuting down of BP's Atlantis.
Maybe one reason is that Edison Chouest Offshore, which leases an onshore support facility for Atlantis to BP, was Cao’s largest campaign contributor in 2009-2010. His top donor is a BP crony. If you want to get Cao’s attention and convince him to put safety first, it seems like $18,000 is the figure you’ll need.
Cao isn’t representing the views of his constituency as much as the views of his pro-drilling cronies. Several leaders of the New Orleans community have been rather outspoken about it.
Greater New Orleans AFL-CIO President Robert Hammond believes that Cao lacks solid knowledge of the issues. Reverend Kenneth G. Thibodeaux of the Asia Baptist Church in New Orleans — a community leader — thinks that Cao is ignoring expert advice regarding the potential danger of Atlantis, and he points to 24 members of Congress who agree that the rig should be shut down until proven safe.
Cao has made a very costly decision, one that reveals that his loyalty is not to Louisiana communities, but to BP.
-Zach Corrigan