Amid questions over the future of the Saudi Arabian-backed LIV Golf tournament planned for City Park this summer, Louisiana Economic Development Secretary Susan Bourgeois has told tournament leaders that the state wants answers by Monday about whether the event is still on.
Bourgeois said Thursday that she emailed officials with LIV, who are currently in Mexico City for the latest stop on their international tour, after multiple financial publications reported Wednesday that Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is considering pulling its support from LIV.
Such a move, the reports said, would likely spell the end of LIV and its upcoming tournaments, including the June event scheduled for New Orleans.
LIV CEO Scott O’Neil has since disputed those reports, saying the 2026 season will continue as planned.
“Needless to say, we are concerned about the reports this week,” Bourgeois said. “They are in Mexico, but I have said, by Monday, we need to have a candid conversation about where this stands.”
Fresh sod is placed at the Bayou Oaks Golf Course in preparation for the LIV Golf tournament in New Orleans, Wednesday, March 25, 2026. (Photo by Sophia Germer, The Times-Picayune)
Gov. Jeff Landry, through a spokesperson, said he still has no official word from the organization on its plans related to New Orleans, though “so far, we have not been notified of anything as far as LIV folding or pulling out.”
Officials with City Park, GNO Inc. and the New Orleans Sports Foundation have declined to comment on the recent reports.
Landry announced amid fanfare last August that New Orleans’s Bayou Oaks Golf Course at City Park would host the LIV Golf tournament, a deal that involved creating a $7.2 million incentive package to lure the event to Louisiana. Though he faced criticism for dipping into the state’s major event fund for the package, he framed the event as an economic development win that would boost tourism during the slow summer season.
Governor Jeff Landry, with club in hand, makes his entrance at a press event touting the LIV Golf Louisiana tournament in New Orleans next year. The event was held at City Park’s Pavillion of the Two Sisters in New Orleans, Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2025. (Staff photo by John McCusker, The Times-Picayune | NOLA.com)
The $7.2 million package included a $5 million “hosting fee” for LIV and $2.2 million for City Park to pay for upgrades to the course.
On Thursday, Bourgeois and Senate President Cameron Henry, a New Orleans Republican who helped garner support for the incentive package in the legislature last summer, said LIV has already received $1 million of its $5 million hosting fee.
“But we have a claw back provision should they falter,” Henry said. “If they should close, we can ask for our money back.”
Of the $2.2 million earmarked for City Park, all but about $300,000 has been paid to the park and spent on regrading surfaces, improving drainage, a new layer of sand and improvements to the turf and greens at Bayou Oaks. The work is nearly complete.
Fresh sod is placed on the putting green of the Bayou Oaks Golf Course in preparation for the LIV Golf tournament in New Orleans, Wednesday, March 25, 2026. (Photo by Sophia Germer, The Times-Picayune)
Though the state is not entitled to go after City Park’s share of the funds in the event of a default, “the improvements will benefit the course as a whole,” Bourgeois said. “It’s an investment in City Park.”
Broader strategy
LIV, launched in 2022 as a controversial alternative to the PGA Tour, is funded in large part by Saudi Arabia’s primary sovereign wealth fund. Despite its high-profile backers, the tour has lost money and struggled to find a TV audience.
In recent days, reports that the Saudis would pull their funding had circulated among golf reporters, with many projecting the move could spell failure for the international tour.
The Financial Times first reported that the personal investment fund overseen by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had narrowed its focus in a new five-year investment strategy that includes cutting LIV spending.
The strategy was reportedly written before the start of the U.S.-Israel war with Iran that led to an effective blockade of the Strait of Hormuz — a critical passageway for Gulf States oil — and structural damage to Gulf countries’ infrastructure. However, fund governor Yasir al-Rumayyan said the war added additional pressure for the fund, The Times reported.
Adding to the questions over LIV’s future, the Saudi fund has sold its star-studded Al-Hilal soccer team, while another Saudi group pulled out of Tom Brady’s flag football league, The Athletic reported Thursday.
Gov. Jeff Landry announced Louisiana’s first LIV Golf event at City Park on Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2025.
While the LIV tour was not a proven concept in New Orleans, Landry has estimated that the tour could generate about $60 million in economic impact.
“We’re very comfortable with the economic impact this could have on the city,” Bourgeois said Thursday.
Beyond the boost to hotels, restaurants and other tourist-related businesses, she said, LIV presents an opportunity to promote the state to the organization’s corporate fan base in Asia and Australia, where it is especially popular.
“There is a real business opportunity for us because the markets, internationally, where LIV has had the most viewership historically are those we have targeted,” Bourgeois said. “We have entire business development plans around this.”
Staff writers Alyse Pfeil and Marco Cartolano contributed to this report.
