(The Center Square) — Louisiana lawmakers are advancing another package of bills aimed at giving state regulators more teeth against imported seafood and steering more public dollars toward local catch.
Two of the three measures by Rep. Jessica Domangue, R-Houma, have already cleared the House unanimously and now await Senate committee hearings, while a third remains pending before the House Appropriations Committee.
The most aggressive proposal, House Bill 121, would authorize Agriculture Commissioner Mike Strain to “seize, hold, or destroy” seafood products that violate state law. The bill passed the House unanimously and awaits the Senate Agriculture, Forestry, Aquaculture, and Rural Development Committee.
Under current law, the commissioner already has authority to enforce seafood testing and reporting rules; the bill would add explicit power to remove unlawful products from the market.
A second bill, House Bill 725, would require retailers to keep seafood purchase records for at least six months and make them available for inspection, while also authorizing civil penalties for missing, false or fraudulent records. That measure also passed the House without opposition and is now pending before the same Senate committee.
The third proposal, House Bill 1170, takes a procurement approach rather than an enforcement one. It would require state and local purchasing agents to buy seafood in Louisiana whenever the local product costs no more than 10% above out-of-state seafood.
State law already requires restaurants and other retailers to clearly disclose when crawfish or shrimp sold to consumers is imported rather than domestic, and recent enforcement has been substantial: 919 restaurants were cited and 319 fined in 2025 for seafood-labeling violations, according to reporting based on state records. The agriculture department has also publicly highlighted recent enforcement actions against businesses that failed to disclose the origins of imported seafood.
That enforcement push comes as shrimpers and state officials describe the local industry as being in outright crisis. Strain said last year that dockside prices for Louisiana Gulf shrimp had fallen to about $1 per pound, blaming a flood of cheaper imports. Industry groups and lawmakers have increasingly paired state-level labeling and inspection efforts with calls for stronger federal trade action against imported shrimp.
“The price of local shrimp has been driven down on the dock to about almost $1/pound and the shrimpers will not survive,” Strain told Fox 8 in November.
Domangue has framed this year’s legislation as part of that larger fight. She said she had been working with Strain on bills to support local fishermen and processors while targeting bad actors in the restaurant industry after hundreds of Louisiana restaurants were cited for failing to disclose imported seafood.
The measures have drawn support from seafood advocates, but with a few caveats. Erin Williams of SeaD Consulting told The Center Square that House Bill 725 “reinforces recordkeeping requirements that largely already exist under federal traceability and HACCP regulations,” but added that documentation alone may not catch mislabeling if it happens earlier in the supply chain.
On House Bill 121, she said the power to seize or destroy seafood raises questions about scope and due process, and suggested lawmakers clarify what types of violations would trigger destruction and whether testing should be required first.
“Prioritizing Louisiana seafood in state purchasing supports local industry, which is important for coastal communities,” Williams said. “SeaD Consulting supports any legislation that helps our commercial fishing communities.”
