You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 27, 2026.

We open by noting the eerie coincidence of Tropical Storm Dolly forming in the Atlantic just 48 hours after Dolly Parton's passing, before turning to a report that FEMA workers skipped homes displaying pro-Trump signage during Hurricane Milton recovery efforts, and why political affiliation should never factor into disaster relief.

We get to our Top 3 things you need to know: Louisiana Judge Stephen Terrell's disqualification from re-election after failing to file his taxes for three straight years, fiscal administrator David Greer's decision to stay on longer in Homer, Louisiana, to finish reconstructing the city's financial records, and Sportran's new autonomous vehicle pilot program coming to Shreveport bus routes.

We dig deep into the Louisiana Board of Regents' $500,000 investment aimed at addressing "food insecurity" among college students, questioning whether the vague terminology is stretching the definition of hunger and whether existing resources like SNAP benefits and community food banks would serve students better than a new state program. We also break down President Trump's executive order renaming Lake Ontario to "Lake America," and run through the ten largest lakes in the country for good measure.

We're joined by Center Square reporter Adam Herbets, who walks us through his investigation into a leaked 2024 memo showing more than 20 Democratic attorneys general coordinating plans to sue a second Trump administration months before the election even happened, and the stonewalling tactics several states have used to block public records requests on the matter.

We also cover a leaked memo from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation instructing staff not to refer to 9/11 as a terrorist attack, and a report that short-staffing among air traffic controllers contributed to a runway collision between an Air Canada flight and a fire truck.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776. 

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avalone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 26, 2026. 

We start by digging into a wild Caddo Parish Commission saga: a judge ruled that seven Democratic commissioners didn't violate the state's Open Meetings Law when they quietly drafted and circulated a proclamation welcoming Bernie Sanders to Shreveport without ever holding a vote or an open meeting, and Attorney General Liz Murrill is now fighting a nearly $245,000 legal-fee order tied to her lawsuit over it. From there we hit the Top 3: Louisiana is set to collect $180 million from Meta over child-safety allegations, a New Orleans teacher is asking the Supreme Court to strike down Louisiana's Ten Commandments classroom law, and Sportran is expanding bus service into West Shreveport.

We also dig into a report that Louisiana's private-sector workers log the longest average work week in the country, and push back on the idea that it points to unfair wages rather than a strong blue-collar work ethic. Digging Deep looks at the murder of Nicholas Dent in New Orleans, allegedly at the hands of a man who had five outstanding felony warrants that were never served, and questions why NOPD never picked him up. We turn to the Secret Service next, where several employees have lost their security clearances amid an investigation into leaks about President Trump's secretive departure from Turkey.

In Say What, we share Justice Clarence Thomas's conversation with Senator Ted Cruz on individual liberty and personal responsibility. Then we reflect on intrinsic motivation through the lens of Dolly Parton and Phil Collins, both of whom kept creating long after fame and fortune stopped being the point, before playing a quick game about America's top theme parks, where Dolly's own Dollywood holds its own against Disney and Universal. We close by weighing in on Jelly Roll's monologue jabs at President Trump while guest-hosting Jimmy Kimmel.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776.

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 25, 2026.

We kick things off pushing back on Louisiana pessimism, pointing to the wave of billion-dollar investment pouring into the state under Governor Jeff Landry, from a steel mill in Ascension Parish to data centers in northwest Louisiana, and now the headline announcement: SpaceX's $100 billion Starbase Louisiana, set to become the largest spaceport in the world near Pecan Island in Vermilion Parish.

In our Top 3, we cover the SpaceX Starbase Louisiana announcement in detail, a Iberville Parish jury awarding Louisiana Supreme Court Justice Jeff Hughes $300,000 in a defamation suit against The Advocate, and the Caddo Parish Commission's push for a $70 million sports complex headed to the November ballot.

In Digging Deep, we get into the messy Louisiana GOP endorsement fight in CD6 between Blake Miguez and Rick Edmonds, the tension between Governor Landry and Miguez, and how Landry's relationships with President Trump, Speaker Mike Johnson, and Steve Scalise helped land the Starbase deal along with the new legislative incentives that made it possible.

We debate President Trump's floated idea of renaming Lake Ontario "Lake America" amid the trade standoff with Canada, and whether that's consistent with his renaming of the Gulf of America.

Our Say What segment honors Dolly Parton, who passed away this week at 80, with a look back at some of her most memorable quotes on resilience, identity, and staying true to yourself.

We also revisit the fight between New York City's government-run grocery stores and immigrant-owned bodegas, play a quick trivia round on which U.S. cities have the most (and fastest-growing) tech job markets, and close with concerns over reports of Canadian officials allegedly coordinating with congressional Democrats to undermine the administration's trade negotiations.

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr.

We open with a hard look at Louisiana's criminal justice bottleneck, sparked by a viral social media post about a repeat offender in Caddo Parish who saw most of his charges dropped. We argue the real issue isn't lenient plea deals but a system without enough jail beds, courtrooms, judges, and prosecutors to keep pace with the volume of crime, and we push for a more honest statewide conversation about capacity rather than just outcomes. From there we hit the top three things you need to know: the Fifth Circuit hearing Louisiana's challenge to mail-order abortion pills, State Senator Blake Miguez earning the Louisiana GOP's endorsement for the newly redrawn 6th Congressional District amid pushback from rival candidates, and Shreveport running out of fluoride for its water supply due to a global shortage tied to the conflict in the Middle East.

We dig deeper into the CD6 endorsement controversy, questioning whether the state party's process was fair after State Senator Rick Edmonds claimed he had more central committee votes than Miguez but still lost the party's backing, and we debate when party endorsements in primaries are appropriate versus when they undermine the will of the voters. We Dig Deep into Louisiana's new physical education standards requiring fitness assessments starting in kindergarten, and swap stories about recess, dodgeball, and the golden age of Parachute Day.

We cover the WNBA's decision to bar former NBA players Enes Kanter Freedom and Royce White from the 2027 draft after they said they identify as women, arguing the league has opened itself up to real legal exposure by rejecting their sincerity rather than defining what makes someone eligible as a woman in the first place. We break down Florida Senate nominee Angie Nixon's attempt to distance herself from her Democratic Socialists of America roots in a new interview, and debate exactly who she's lying to: the base that nominated her or the general election voters she now needs. We revisit the Freedom 250 Indy car race through the streets of D.C., making the case that a little national audacity is worth the road closures and the cost. We play a numbers game on which states saw the highest and lowest job growth in 2025, with red states dominating the top of the list. We close with a lighthearted jab at Jared Kushner's meeting with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, debating what it does or doesn't signal about the balance of power on Capitol Hill.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776.

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 21, 2026. 

We open with good news out of New Orleans: the Louisiana National Guard is wrapping up its eight-month deployment by August 31st, a withdrawal made possible by violent crime dropping to near-historic lows, with murders nearly cut in half since 2022. We compare New Orleans' success to similar Guard deployments in Memphis and D.C. versus the stalled effort in Chicago, and we debate whether Mayor Helena Moreno is quietly relieved to see the Guard go. We move into the top three things you need to know: the Guard's confirmed departure date, an ICE officer arrested in St. Tammany Parish for breaking into his ex-girlfriend's apartment, and a third round of pay stipends approved for Bossier Parish teachers and support staff.

We dig into New Orleans' sanitation department paying private contractors to service nearly 5,000 addresses the city itself has already flagged as retired, duplicate, or ineligible, a waste uncovered only because the Louisiana Legislative Auditor got involved after the city borrowed money from the state. We go Digging Deep on the growing gap between what Louisiana reimburses parishes for housing state inmates and what it actually costs, using Caddo and Washington Parish as case studies, and we argue the state's failure to build a new prison since 1991 is driving overcrowding and cost-shifting onto local sheriffs.

We cover the Supreme Court's decision, authored by Chief Justice Roberts, allowing construction to continue on the White House's $400 million ballroom project, and we make the case that the underlying controversy was really about the secure bunker beneath it. In our Say What segment, we play a clip of California Governor Gavin Newsom encouraging residents to sign up for Trump accounts, and we take the rare opportunity to credit him for setting politics aside on this one issue. We break down the Trump administration's decision to end Temporary Protected Status for Haitian nationals and begin repatriation flights, framing it as a matter of fairness to immigrants who followed the legal process. We play a lighthearted guessing game on which states have the most professional sports franchises, with California topping the list. We close by criticizing a wave of New York City Council proposals, including a $30 minimum wage, an elephant ban, and mandated sick leave for sick pets, arguing the city is ignoring its real problems in favor of symbolic legislation.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776.

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 20, 2026.

We open with a defense of local police departments turning to the public for help solving crimes, using a post from Shreveport Police Department spokesman Chris Bortolon to make the case that asking for tips isn't a failure but the foundation of constitutional policing, especially with only 400 officers covering a city of 180,000. We tie that into a broader conversation about the "snitches get stitches" culture that lets crimes go unsolved and argue that communities get the policing culture they're willing to participate in.

From there we hit the top three things you need to know: three Baton Rouge judges suing the Landry administration over a decades-old voting rights case tied to redrawn judicial districts, a ruling that keeps judges on the bench for the Capital Area Transit System corruption trials despite the Attorney General's objections, and strong signs that SpaceX is negotiating with Governor Jeff Landry to build a new spaceport along the Vermilion Parish coast.

We Dig Deep into a disturbing story out of Caddo Parish, where a former substitute teacher is accused of sending five false active-shooter alerts to local schools after she stopped getting called for work, and we praise the district for not rehiring her in the first place. We stay in Shreveport for a look at the city's new police drone pilot program, which arrived at calls before officers 74 percent of the time, weighing the efficiency gains against privacy concerns and the staffing costs of managing the fleet.

We break down Nike's roughly 80 percent stock slide since 2021, debating how much of that is tied to the brand's shift into cultural and political messaging versus its decision to cut ties with retailers like Foot Locker. We discuss Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy's on-camera conversation with his daughter Paloma about why he won't let her attend Harvard, and the larger question of how much influence elite universities have over students raised with strong family values. We cover the falling-out between Alan Dershowitz and Larry David, once close friends on Martha's Vineyard, now estranged after Dershowitz left the Democratic Party over its drift on antisemitism and his opposition to Trump's impeachment. We play a lighthearted guessing game around the Archbridge Institute's ranking of state occupational licensing burdens, with Oregon topping the list. And we close out discussing ActBlue co-founder Matt DeBergalis pleading the Fifth during closed-door congressional testimony, amid allegations of fraudulent donations funneled through the platform.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776.

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 19, 2026.

We open with a live, in-studio moment as Caddo Parish Commissioner Greg Young joins us on the heels of controversy over telling law enforcement to "escort this man from my building" during a commission meeting. We dig into why that language matters, breaking down the difference between institutional authority and personal ownership, and why elected officials are stewards of public power rather than owners of it. In the top three things you need to know, we cover a Louisiana Legislative Auditor's report finding New Orleans isn't charging enough for garbage collection to cover its costs, the Shreveport Police Department's new $10,000 sign-on bonuses to combat officer shortages, and a Jefferson Parish Sheriff's deputy fired for misusing Flock camera data to track his ex-fiancée.

We Dig Deep into Louisiana State Senator Alan Seabaugh's run for Caddo Parish District Attorney and his claims about repeat offenders and prosecutorial aggressiveness, weighing the jury trial data against his critique. From there we cover Los Angeles's taxpayer-funded campaign matching program benefiting Mayor Karen Bass, South Carolina Senate candidate Sheri Biggs (Lindsey Graham's sister) stumbling on a national security question during a debate, and President Trump personally walking reporters through White House construction projects. We also run through a state-by-state breakdown of where it's most and least affordable to live comfortably, and close with Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz's surprising rejection of the Democratic Socialists of America.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776. 

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 18, 2026.

We open on the overcrowding crisis at Caddo Correctional Center, where more than 1,700 inmates are packed into a facility originally designed for 1,050 and now sits roughly 60% over capacity, well past the fire marshal's 1,500-person limit. We press on Sheriff Henry Whitehorn's silence on the issue and question why the Caddo Parish Commission hasn't prioritized jail expansion over projects like a proposed $60 million sports complex and a $10 million pickleball facility.

We run through our Top 3 stories you need to know: Orleans Parish Chief Judge Juana Lombard's disqualification from reelection over unfiled 2023 state income taxes, Amazon's additional $6 billion investment in its Shreveport-Caddo data center footprint on top of its earlier $12 billion commitment, and a construction delay on the new DeSoto Parish Sheriff's detention facility after its general contractor filed for bankruptcy.

We then bring on Caddo Parish Commissioner Chris Crackman, who confirms the sheriff has never formally requested funding from the commission to expand jail space and argues that money earmarked for recreational projects would be better spent adding beds to the correctional center and juvenile justice facility.

From there we turn to the disparity between Dr. Fauci's unconditional pardon and his former senior advisor David Morens, who at 78 pled guilty to conspiracy charges tied to evading Freedom of Information Act requests during the COVID era, the same conduct we argue Fauci himself engaged in.

We play a Say What clip of Senator Rick Scott arguing that Democratic leaders Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer have already capitulated to the Democratic Socialists of America on issues like open borders, court packing, and policing, and we walk through each of those policy areas ourselves.

We discuss the Trump administration's plan to deploy roughly 1,000 DOJ election monitors for the November 2026 midterms, historic in scale but consistent with monitoring practices under past administrations of both parties, alongside recent reporting on foreign hacking attempts targeting U.S. elections.

We play a guessing game around the Washington Post's ranking of the best college football towns in America, working our way through Fargo, Boulder, Austin, and more.

We close by talking Rosie O'Donnell's guest-hosting stint on Jimmy Kimmel Live, her jokes about Trump, and what it says that he still occupies so much space in her head years after she left for Ireland and came back.

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776.

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 17, 2026.

We open by digging into a legislative auditor's report on the Shreveport city marshal's office, which spent nearly $10,000 on lodging for four employees at a Destin, Florida conference, well above the rates state judges and city employees are actually capped at, and we make the case for why "permissible" isn't the same as right when it comes to public money.

From there we run through the headlines you need to know, covering the Port of New Orleans' major expansion into St. Bernard Parish, a lawsuit from Calvin Duncan over the elimination of the New Orleans criminal clerk of court position, and the end of six decades of federal oversight over desegregation in Bienville Parish schools.

We dig into Louisiana's ongoing jail capacity problem, arguing that no politician's tough-on-crime promise means anything until they answer where the criminals are actually going to be held, and we touch on a Natchitoches Parish lawsuit over inmate transfers between jails. We also cover reports of 400% food price inflation hitting ordinary Iranians under the ayatollahs, the Democratic National Committee's "big tent" comments out of its Austin meeting and what we think it reveals about the party's lack of a coherent standard, and a CBS News/YouGov poll on Democrats' favorable views of socialism.

We play a game guessing which states have the most Fortune 500 company headquarters, and close with CNBC hosts pushing back on Democrats' economic doom-and-gloom in light of low unemployment and cooling inflation. 

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776.

You're listening to American Ground Radio with Louis R. Avallone and Stephen Parr. This is the full show for August 14, 2026. 

We open with a look at Louisiana's new law extending citizenship and immigration verification requirements to NGOs administering taxpayer-funded public benefits, and make the case for why charity funded by taxation isn't really charity at all. From there we run through the headlines you need to know, covering reports of talks between the state of Louisiana and SpaceX over a possible launch pad in Vermilion Parish, the arrest of a Grand Coteau assistant police chief on malfeasance charges, and an extended FEMA deadline for Tropical Storm Arthur disaster assistance.

We dig into Louisiana's crime debate and the uncomfortable question nobody wants to answer: where do you actually put criminals if you get tough on sentencing but don't build more jail space? In our Digging Deep segment, we break down the DNC's new "Southern State Resources Hub" and why we think the party misunderstands why the South is thriving in the first place.

We also tackle President Trump's declaration that he intends to claim the Strait of Hormuz as U.S. territory, walking through the legal impossibility of the claim and making the case that it's really trolling aimed at Iran, with a nod to how Reagan used humor as a political weapon.

We cover the sentencing of an illegal immigrant convicted of voter fraud and passport fraud, play a game guessing which states have the cheapest gas in the country, and close by revisiting Bernie Sanders' refusal to endorse a Democratic Socialist candidate in Wisconsin and what it reveals about the limits of his own ideology. 

Listen now wherever you get your podcasts, visit AmericanGroundRadio.com, and join the conversation at 866-AGR-1776.