NATION IN BRIEF : LOUISIANA : Ex-Klan Leader to Run for U.S. Senate

Republican state Rep. David Duke, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, said that he will seek the U.S. Senate seat of J. Bennett Johnston (D-La.). The Louisiana GOP plans to endorse a candidate Jan. 12, but Duke said that he probably will run even if he is not the party’s choice. He joins a field of two other Republicans who are seeking Johnston’s seat. Duke, who in the past has been associated with the far-right Populist Party, disavowed his racist beliefs when he was sworn in as a state representative. Since leaving the klan in the 1970s, he has headed the National Assn. of White People, which he says promotes “equal rights for everyone.”