The stakes may be monumental in the BP trial under way in New Orleans, but the legal bout lacks the essential elements of a courtroom drama. Guilt has been determined in the oil giant’s criminal plea agreement with the U.S. Justice Department, which also establishes that BP was negligent. The big question for the trial to settle is how negligent, for a ruling of gross negligence and willful misconduct could quadruple the fines for each barrel of oil that flowed into the Gulf of Mexico, pushing the award to five coastal states—primarily Louisiana—to over $20 billion. According to the Wall Street Journal, Justice and the states are prepared to offer to settle for $16 billion. Whether by verdict or settlement, from there the real drama begins, a political one, with state leaders wrangling over how to spend a sizable chunk of the fine money, as much as $1 billion, that will come with strings loosely attached. Deciding where those funds go will test the political will behind the rhetoric of state leaders’ commitment to restoring the eroding, sinking coast. It’s easy to be four-square behind the coastal cause when there is little to spend on it. That could change when the money is at hand. Read the full column here.
(John Maginnis publishes LaPolitics Weekly, a newsletter on Louisiana politics, at LaPolitics.com.)
