By Courtney Bell | LSU Manship School News Service
BATON ROUGE–Julie Emerson was only 27 when she became the youngest Republican woman elected to the Louisiana House of Representatives.
Over the last two years, she emerged as one of Gov. Jeff Landry’s floor leaders, helping to push through ambitious proposals to flatten personal income tax rates, expand state funding for private school tuition and redesign how Louisiana holds some of its elections. On Tuesday, Landry brought Emerson, now 37, into his administration as his new chief of staff.
How did Emerson, who also was the first woman to chair a finance committee in the Legislature, accomplish so much at such a young age?
Lawmakers say she thinks big and sweats the details. She likes to talk things over with other lawmakers to try to get them on the same page. And though deeply conservative, she has been willing to reach out to Democrats to discuss their concerns.
“Julie’s a legislator that has just a very unique ability to bring legislation that is transformative to our state and actually see it all the way through to become law,” House Speaker Phillip DeVillier, R-Eunice, said in a recent interview.
Rep. Jack McFarland, R-Jonesboro, the chair of the House Appropriations Committee, said it was always clear that Emerson was “not coming into any committee or even on the House floor without being very well versed and educated about whatever her presentation is.”
“It’s that type of work ethic – it’s contagious, and it makes other people want to rise up when you have that type of work ethic,” McFarland said.
Even one of the most liberal Democrats in the House, Rep. Mandie Landry, D-New Orleans, described Emerson as responsive to her concerns.
“She will reach out when she has questions or knows that I will oppose the legislation she is presenting,” Landry said in an email.
Emerson was born in Homer in North Louisiana but grew up in Carencro, a town of 13,000 just north of Lafayette. She has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and a master’s in business administration from the University of South Carolina.
Looking ahead at term limits in the state House–with her third term ending in 2028–Emerson announced last fall that she would run for the U.S. Senate seat now held by Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy.
Emerson runs a media strategy and public relations consulting firm, and she said its polling showed support for Cassidy across the state had dropped, leaving the opportunity for a more consistently conservative candidate to join the race.
Emerson said then she felt she represented a “new, different type of leadership and strong conservative values” that could make concrete progress for the state from the federal level.
She dropped out of the U.S. Senate race last month after U.S. Rep. Julia Letlow announced her candidacy following a post from President Donald Trump on Truth Social that read “RUN, JULIA, RUN!”
Instead, she will succeed Kyle Ruckert as Landry’s chief of staff, where she can continue to work on topics like tax reform, insurance and crime.
“A lot of those issues we’ve tackled,” Emerson said in an earlier interview. “But now I think kind of after the dust settles when you do all these major reforms, you see maybe some areas where you need to continue a little bit more work.”
Emerson said the tax changes, which included lower corporate taxes, have made the state’s tax code “a little more friendly and open for economic growth in Louisiana and creating more jobs.” She said more than $70 billion in investments have been announced in the state since then.
Emerson’s election bill eliminated primary elections for some offices that were open to candidates from all parties. It replaced them with primaries in which only voters in one party or unaffiliated voters can cast ballots for candidates in that party.
But mainly because of concerns by state senators and teachers worried about potential cuts down the road in public school funding, Landry has only been able to get about half the money he sought for the LA Gator program to give state money to families to send their children to private schools.
While touting her conservative voting record in these areas, Emerson said working across the aisle has always been important to her.
“It doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to compromise anything,” she said in the interview. “It just means that you have the ability to talk to the other side and work with them on things that are important to both of you.”
Dixon McMakin, R-Baton Rouge, said she even had an extra seat next to hers in the House chamber so other representatives could sit and learn from her.
McMakin brought up a bill to eventually eliminate personal income tax. Though it did not pass, he said guidance from Emerson deepened his understanding of the legislative process.
“And so I have a lot of respect for her of how she’s come up from such a young age to now her leadership,” McMakin said. “And her style is very much talking to people, making them understand the issues, really getting down to the details and someone I hope to be like in the future.”
Emerson said she did not expect to get involved in public service as young as she did. But she found her way to the Capitol through her polling and research firm and by advising on campaigns.
She has worked on several of U.S. Rep. Clay Higgins’ campaigns and on Secretary of State Nancy Landry’s campaign in 2023.
“I didn’t exactly foresee that I would be in public service like this and have a hands-on approach to try to make Louisiana better, but I am very grateful for it,” Emerson said. “I certainly hope that I have been able to make a strong impact in growing our state and making it better for people to live here.”