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TEMPE – The Air Force plans to retire 42 A-10 aircraft at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson next year, according to a state lawmaker, a move that would cut the base’s fleet of the storied “Warthogs” in half. Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Tucson, identified the proposed cuts in letters to the Air Force and to.

PHOENIX – On the heels of dire warnings that America is entering the worst week of the COVID-19 pandemic, Arizona health officials Monday reported a surge in COVID-19 cases over the weekend, with 687 new cases bringing the total to 2,456 known infections and 65 deaths. On Sunday, Surgeon General Jerome Adams on Fox News.

PHOENIX – Nearly a month into a seemingly worldwide shutdown, it may be hard to find an everyday business or public area that has not been closed because of COVID-19. Many companies have allowed their employees to work from home, but businesses deemed essential are still in operation. This includes grocery stores, fuel stations, banks,.

PHOENIX – Tribal response to the 2020 Census badly trails state and national rates, according to Census Bureau data, with the already-challenging task of counting in tribal areas further complicated by the arrival of COVID-19. U.S. and Arizona response rates to the questionnaire that went out in mid-March were hovering around one-third of the expected.

PHOENIX – A group of immigrant detainees have filed suit against U.S. officials, alleging federal inaction during the COVID-19 outbreak endangers those in detention and violates the Constitution. In a lawsuit filed March 30, four Cuban asylum seekers and one green-card holder facing deportation accused the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review and Immigration.

PHOENIX – The state is adding $600 to the maximum weekly unemployment benefit of $240, and the first checks should go out as soon as next week, the Arizona Department of Economic Security said Wednesday. The money was added in response to the tidal wave of workers laid off because of the novel coronavirus, with.

TEMPE – Gov. Doug Ducey’s “stay home” order had not even taken effect before critics were arguing Tuesday over whether it is enforceable and if it goes far enough to protect Arizona from the spread of coronavirus. The directive, which took effect at 5 p.m. Tuesday, says state residents “shall limit their time away” from.

PHOENIX – Gov. Doug Ducey’s statewide stay-at-home order doesn’t go far enough to stop Arizonans from leaving their homes, some other elected officials say. Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego, who had called for Ducey to issue a stay-at-home order, questioned the list of what Ducey considered essential services and called it laughable. Hair salons and golf.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump signed a $2 trillion economic stimulus package just hours after it was rushed through the House Friday, clearing the way for aid to businesses, increased benefits for workers and direct payments to taxpayers. The bipartisan CARES Act passed the House on a voice vote, over the objections of some members,.

PHOENIX – The spread of COVID-19 in Arizona communities rose from “moderate” to “widespread” on Thursday, meaning there were confirmed cases in 13 of the state’s 15 counties, according to the Arizona Department of Health Services. Gila and Greenlee were the two counties with no confirmed cases. Maricopa County leads the state with 299 confirmed.

WASHINGTON – The Senate gave unanimous approval late Wednesday to a historic $2 trillion economic stimulus package that calls for direct payments to taxpayers and hundreds of billions in relief for small businesses and targeted industries, like airlines. The 96-0 vote capped days of bitter debate and contentious negotiating that included two party-line votes that.

WASHINGTON – When countries started closing their borders this month in response to the coronavirus pandemic, it left thousands of Americans trapped overseas struggling to find a way home. Americans like Arizona State University senior Gabriela Fioretti. Fioretti, 21, was wrapping up what was supposed to be a weeklong family trip to Peru on March.

PHOENIX – A new report from the data firm Civis Analytics says Maricopa County is at risk of the second greatest undercount in the 2020 census – which could end in losses up to $13.2 million in federal funding for some communities that already are underserved. The report estimates a 70,500 undercount in the county,.

PHOENIX – Arizona mayors Tuesday questioned Gov. Doug Ducey’s inclusion of golf courses, pawnshops, laundries and other businesses in the definition of “essential services” that local governments would be barred from closing in response to the coronavirus. Flagstaff Mayor Coral Evans, who wrote to Ducey along with mayors from Tucson, Somerton, Tolleson and Winslow, said.

PHOENIX – Gov. Doug Ducey does not plan to order a shelter-in-place lockdown for Arizona, despite orders issued in neighboring states of California and New Mexico for residents to stay indoors, he said in a news conference Monday. “We’re following the facts related specifically to the state of Arizona,” the governor said. “The CDC isn’t.

WASHINGTON – The Senate deadlocked for a second day Monday on more than $1 trillion in proposed support for an economy buffeted by coronavirus, as Democrats said the bill gives too much to corporations and Republicans accuse Democrats of making it a liberal wish list. A procedural vote to cut off debate on the measure,.

WASHINGTON – Constituents with concerns about the stimulus bill working its way through Congress this week can still share their opinions with their representatives in Washington – even though their representatives may not actually be in Washington. Arizona lawmakers, like the rest of Congress and much of the nation, are learning to telework in the.

PHOENIX – This week’s Democratic presidential preference election in Arizona was no contest, as voters clearly favored Joe Biden over Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Biden also won Illinois and Florida Tuesday night, prompting Sanders to announce he’s assessing his candidacy. As of 4:45 p.m. Thursday, the most recent totals from the Arizona Secretary of State’s.

The Senate gave overwhelming approval Wednesday to a multibillion-dollar coronavirus relief bill, the second such bill in two weeks, and immediately turned its attention to a third bill that could have a $1 trillion price tag. Both Arizona senators voted for the bill that passed 90-8 after the House agreed to weaken language that would.

WASHINGTON – Former Vice President Joe Biden was soundly beating Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in early returns from Arizona’s presidential preference election Tuesday, according to preliminary returns from the Arizona Secretary of State’s office. Two hours after the polls closed, Biden had 213,964 votes to Sanders’ 151,066, a margin of 42.6% to 30.1% of the.

TEMPE – Voting in Arizona’s presidential preference primary Tuesday was decidedly calm in the midst of a decidedly anxious time in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, polling officials around the state said. Concerns about COVID-19 prompted Ohio officials to cancel their primary just hours before polls were set to open Tuesday, but elections in.

WASHINGTON – Business leaders pushed back Monday against a coronavirus relief bill the House passed over the weekend that calls for extended sick leave, as well as new funding for testing, school lunches, senior nutrition and more. The Families First Coronavirus Response Act passed the House early Saturday on a 363-40 vote, but was quickly.

TEMPE – The Democratic presidential primary will be held Tuesday as scheduled, despite the COVID-19 pandemic that has driven some other states to cancel in-person voting, Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs said in a statement Monday. The announcement comes days after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended canceling or postponing in-person gatherings.

WASHINGTON – Dennis Gastineau had a feeling it might happen. The Mayo Clinic faculty member cast an early ballot in Arizona’s presidential preference primary for Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar – who subsequently dropped out of the Democratic primary and threw her support to former Vice President Joe Biden. “I had a sort of sense as.

WASHINGTON – One of the first things Ken Cuccinelli did after being named acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services was to issue a directive sharply cutting the amount of time migrants have to make their case for asylum. One problem – Cuccinelli was not legally the acting director, a court ruled. That March.

WASHINGTON – If endorsements were worth votes or campaign funds, Elizabeth Warren would have Arizona locked up for next week’s Democratic presidential primary. But the Massachusetts senator, who got more endorsements from Arizona elected officials than any other presidential hopeful, suspended her campaign Thursday after disappointing finishes in early primary states. Campaigns love to tout.

PHOENIX – Sen. Bernie Sanders rallied exuberant supporters Thursday night in his first visit to Arizona for his 2020 presidential campaign, speaking to a growing progressive movement in Arizona some community activists say is spurred by years of anti-immigration policy. “Let us do everything we can to make sure Arizona has the highest voter turnout.

PHOENIX — Gov. Doug Ducey’s fiscal 2021 budget proposes spending about $5 million to provide body cameras to all sworn personnel in the Arizona Department of Public Safety, but some critics of police use of deadly force worry the cameras will be used to protect officers more than the public. The request came after a.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump told an audience of Latino business leaders Wednesday that Hispanics are seeing economic gains across the board as a result of tax cuts and regulatory rollbacks that have led to “the booming Trump economy.” Trump’s comments were warmly received at a legislative summit held by the Latino Coalition, a business.

WASHINGTON – The House late Wednesday approved $8.3 billion in emergency funding to combat the coronavirus, passing the measure an overwhelming 415-2 vote – with an Arizona lawmaker counting for one of the two “nays.” Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Gilbert, said after the vote that the original $2.5 billion request from the Trump administration was sufficient.

PHOENIX – Seventy-five years after the atrocities of Auschwitz, memories of the Holocaust are fading for younger generations who learn little about genocides in school, according to education advocates who believe they have the answer: Make it Arizona law to teach about the horrors of the Nazi’s “Final Solution.” After a 2018 study showed that.

WASHINGTON – Arizona health care advocates are confident that President Donald Trump’s plan to slash billions from health services is “dead on arrival” in Congress – but that doesn’t mean they’re not angry at the administration’s direction. The reductions are included in Trump’s fiscal 2021 budget request released last month, which includes $94.5 billion for.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. _ Grand Canyon University student Talesa Jaramillo-Ortiz was excited to be celebrating with like-minded activists at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference here – even as she worried about the specter of socialism in this fall’s elections. Jaramillo-Ortiz said youth support for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in the Democratic presidential primary was.

WASHINGTON – Martha McSally can still claim the title Sen. Martha McSally, R-Ariz., after a federal court this week rejected a claim that her 2018 appointment by Gov. Doug Ducey was unconstitutional. The ruling upheld a lower court’s dismissal of a claim that the time between the appointment of a replacement for the late Sen..

WASHINGTON – Former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio is still guilty of criminal contempt, but that finding cannot be used against him in any future court proceedings, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday. And Arpaio said he’s OK with that. “The main thing – the conviction cannot be used in future court proceedings, they can’t.

PHOENIX – Maricopa County will implement new voting equipment and procedures in all polling locations in time for the Democratic presidential preference vote March 17, the Aug. 4 primary election and the Nov. 3 general election. The new equipment – ballot tabulators and accessibility improvements – cost about $6.1 million in total and will replace.

WASHINGTON – Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick returned to Congress Wednesday and pledged to be back on the campaign trail Saturday after a self-imposed six-week leave of absence to get treatment for alcohol dependence. The Tucson Democrat, who was already back in a House Appropriations Committee hearing Wednesday, said in a statement that she is grateful to.

PHOENIX – The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, in a tense public meeting Wednesday morning, voted 4-1 to declare Maricopa a “Second Amendment Preservation County.” The resolution follows a growing movement of “Second Amendment sanctuaries” across the United States. Although there is no set definition of the term, it refers to states, counties and municipalities.

FLAGSTAFF – Flagstaff businesses are struggling to deal with the highest minimum wage in the state, set in 2016 when voters pushed to set a living wage for workers. The state minimum wage reached $12 an hour in January, several years after voters approved a stair-step approach to raising wages. But Flagstaff established even more.

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear Arizona’s challenge to California’s “extraordinarily aggressive” application of a tax against thousands of out-of-state companies, including as many as 13,000 in Arizona. Attorney General Mark Brnovich claimed in a petition to the court last year that California collects more than $10 million a year from.

WASHINGTON – Arizona’s presidential preference primary is still almost a month away, but voters are already making their preferences known with their wallets. Campaign finance reports released Friday by the Federal Election Commission show Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders had raised $768,054 in Arizona through Jan. 31, well ahead of the No. 2 Democratic fundraiser, Massachusetts.

PHOENIX – Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Wednesday took three-term New York City mayor and multibillionaire Michael Bloomberg to task over numerous allegations of workplace sexual harassment. “I’d like to talk about who we’re running against, a billionaire who calls women fat broads and horsefaced lesbians,” she said during the Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas..

PHOENIX – As a Somali refugee and determined activist, Naruro Hassan is used to other people speaking on behalf of the refugee community. Yet she was finally able to make her own voice heard Feb. 10, when a group of more than 50 lobbyists for refugee rights joined her at the Arizona Capitol to attend.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump brought thousands out to his rally Wednesday at Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum – what he likely did not bring was $145,000 to reimburse local governments for costs from previous rallies in Arizona. That’s how much Tucson and Mesa billed the Trump campaign for police protection and other services at rallies.

PHOENIX – President Donald Trump hit familiar notes ranging from the economy to Arizona-focused issues such as immigration and sanctuary cities in a Wednesday night rally at the Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum. The president roused thousands of supporters as he continued on the reelection campaign trail – the same night six Democrats debated in neighboring.

PHOENIX — Supporters lined up outside Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum ahead of President Donald Trump’s rally Wednesday night kept the energy high with chants of “USA!” “Build the wall!” and “Four more years!” The rally comes weeks after the Senate acquitted Trump after an impeachment trial. He is scheduled to speak to a packed crowd.

WASHINGTON – The Trump administration took another step toward expediting construction of a border wall Tuesday, announcing it is waiving federal contracting regulations to fast track construction in four states, including Arizona. The targeted regulations, dealing with contracting, pricing and wage regulations, need to be waived “to ensure the expeditious construction of barriers and roads”.

PHOENIX – Supporters of President Donald Trump already are lining up outside Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum in expectation of the president’s rally Wednesday evening. Only those with tickets will be admitted. You can register for free tickets here. There is a limit of two tickets per phone number. Gov. Doug Ducey is expected to meet.

WASHINGTON – The Democratic National Committee on Friday tapped Phoenix to host a presidential primary debate next month, a move that state Democrats called an acknowledgment of Arizona’s increasing importance in the 2020 election. The March 15 debate comes less than two weeks after Super Tuesday primaries that are likely to narrow the Democratic field..

PHOENIX – Inaccurate census figures can lead to a loss of federal funds essential for many communities, and they can result in a state losing seats in Congress. These worries are especially prevalent in Arizona, where there are considerable populations of immigrants and Native Americans. Census Bureau officials are working to clear up any doubts.

WASHINGTON – The Trump administration plans to tap the Pentagon for another $3.8 billion in military funds to pay for border wall construction this year, a move critics blasted as “theft,” a raid and a money grab. The fund transfers, detailed in Defense Department budget documents uncovered Thursday, would use money that had been budgeted.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers split on party lines Thursday as the House voted to give the Equal Rights Amendment another chance by removing the deadline for states to ratify the proposed constitutional amendment. The vote came just weeks after Virginia became the key 38th state to ratify the ERA, which would have put the amendment.

WASHINGTON – Arizona Republican Sen. Martha McSally officially kicked off the campaign to retain her seat this week, entering a race already awash in cash and which one national analyst calls the “marquee Senate race of the cycle.” McSally currently trails likely Democratic challenger Mark Kelly in fundraising, bringing in $12.6 million by the end.

WASHINGTON – The House Natural Resources Committee granted Chairman Raul Grijalva, D-Tucson, the authority Wednesday to subpoena administration officials, after committee Democrats said they were “left with no choice” in the face of bureaucrats’ resistance. The party-line vote gives Grijalva the ability to issue subpoenas for records or testimony related to “mismanagement, waste, fraud, abuse.

WASHINGTON – Voting barriers for Native Americans have always existed, but polling cutbacks, discriminatory voter ID laws and lack of funding for elections are making things worse, advocates told a House panel Tuesday. “What was old is new again,” said Rep. Marcia L. Fudge, D-Ohio, who chaired the hearing. “It is not only appropriate, but.

WASHINGTON – Arizona officials said they will fight to make sure that Davis-Monthan Air Force Base does not take a hit as a result of the Pentagon’s decision to retire 44 A-10 fighter jets, a mainstay at the Tucson base. The reduction was included in the fiscal 2021 budget unveiled Monday by the Trump administration,.

WASHINGTON – Despite some “encouraging developments,” threats to tribal sovereignty still come “from every branch and every corner of federal and state governments,” the president of the National Congress of American Indians said Monday. NCAI President Fawn Sharp said in a wide-ranging State of Indian Nations address that the state of the nations is strong,.

PHOENIX – A bill that would disqualify early election ballots that are missing signatures would violate voters’ rights, opponents say. Senate Bill 1032 would throw out a vote if the envelope containing the ballot wasn’t signed as required – that signature confirms the person is registered to vote and voted on the ballot tucked inside..

WASHINGTON – Arizona’s senators fell in line with their respective parties Wednesday as the Senate voted to acquit President Donald Trump on two articles of impeachment that could have forced his removal from office. Every Republican in the chamber voted to reject a charge of obstruction of Congress, which failed 53-47, and all but one.

WASHINGTON – An eighth-grader from Scottsdale and the parents of slain Prescott native Kayla Mueller were among President Donald Trump’s surprise guests for his State of the Union address Tuesday night. Carl and Marsha Mueller, whose daughter Kayla was killed while doing humanitarian work in the Middle East in 2015, were seated in the first.

WASHINGTON – For more than an hour Tuesday, President Donald Trump talked about the “Great American Comeback” that has occurred under his administration, in a State of the Union address that Democrats said described instead “a parallel universe.” Trump’s third State of the Union had all the hallmarks of a campaign speech, including Republican chants.

WASHINGTON – For Michael Waldman, a speechwriter for former President Bill Clinton, the guests at the State of the Union address are “often as interesting as what’s on stage.” “You can tell lot of the message from the stagecraft,” said Waldman, now the president of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University’s School.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump said this weekend that Tuesday’s State of the Union Address will have a “very, very positive message.” Political experts say they’ll believe it when they see it. With Trump’s speech coming a day after the Iowa caucuses and a day before the Senate votes on his impeachment, some experts expect.

PHOENIX — Michael Bloomberg told supporters that Arizona could pave his path to the White House, with the state as a major battleground of the 2020 presidential election. “The road to the White House runs through Arizona,” he told a cheering crowd at a weekend rally to open his Arizona campaign office. In his wide-ranging.

WASHINGTON – Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema broke her silence Friday, voting with other Democrats in a failed attempt to call more witnesses in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, which now heads to a final vote next week. The 51-49 vote rejected efforts by Democrats to call witnesses like former National Security Adviser John Bolton, who.

PHOENIX – For Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego, garbage and recycling day has become a weekly holiday she and her 3-year-old son celebrate. “We have to go out and wave to the garbage trucks,” Gallego said. “Sometimes they’ll honk for him, and we have special permission from our neighbors to celebrate garbage day and it’s just.

WASHINGTON – Arizona Reps. Andy Biggs and David Schweikert were among just 11 Republicans who crossed party lines Thursday as the House voted to limit the president’s ability to pursue military action without approval from Congress. The vote to revoke the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force came just moments after the House –.

PHOENIX – Several lawmakers and community leaders on Thursday said the state needs a law to protect Arizonans from being fired, denied housing or refused service because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Lawmakers failed to get a similar law passed last year, but supporters have returned to introduce a bill that would add.

WASHINGTON – When senators return to their roles as jurors Wednesday in the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump, they will get to do something jurors in a normal trial never get to do – question the attorneys. But that’s not the only difference between a normal jury and these “jurors,” who can wander off.

WASHINGTON – A divided federal appeals court Monday overturned Arizona’s ban on ballot-harvesting and its policy of rejecting ballots accidentally cast in the wrong precinct, calling both reflections of the state’s “long and unhappy history of official discrimination” in elections. The 239-page ruling by the full 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals laid out in.

WASHINGTON – They came from across the country but the thousands who turned out for Friday’s 47th March for Life had the same goal – reversing Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that recognized a woman’s right to an abortion. For marchers like Katie Forbes of Tempe, the “magnitude and the scale” of.

WASHINGTON – Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego told an audience of elected officials Thursday that while cities across the country are forced to be creative in the fight to provide affordable housing, it’s a particular challenge in her city. With the nation’s fastest-growing city on the one hand, and restrictions from state lawmakers and private-sector organizations.

WASHINGTON – Arizona enacted a ban on texting while driving last year, after 10 years of trying, but it still wasn’t enough to pull the state from the bottom of a national report card on traffic safety laws. The annual Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety report said Arizona had just five of 16 recommended.

WASHINGTON – They were Democratic and Republican mayors from cities large and small across the country, but officials on the panel Wednesday on immigration agreed – it’s an issue they all grapple with. For Mesa Mayor John Giles, the U.S. Conference of Mayors event “reiterated to me that immigration, and immigration reform issues, are not.

WASHINGTON – Democratic National Committee officials said they plan to focus aggressively on Maricopa County voters as part of their efforts to swing Arizona, one of six battleground states where the party plans to invest millions in 2020. DNC spokesman David Bergstein said the initiative will “roughly double the number of field organizers across the.

WASHINGTON – Testimony in the Senate impeachment trial of President Donald Trump began Tuesday, with at least two Arizonans looking on in unofficial capacities as senators engaged in an all-day debate of procedure. On the floor, Arizona Sens. Martha McSally, a Republican, and Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat, followed their parties as the GOP-controlled Senate rejected.

WASHINGTON – Arizona religious groups said the Trump administration’s release this week of regulations aimed at protecting religious expression “rights a serious wrong,” but others expect the moves will have little practical impact. Foremost in the raft of rules rolled out by the White House Thursday is federal guidance on reporting schools that violate a.

WASHINGTON – Arizona was identified Thursday as one of seven states where Democrats plan to “fight like hell” to turn the state government from red to blue in 2020. Democrats still are in the minority in the Arizona Senate and House of Representatives. But after gains in the 2018 elections, political experts in the state.

WASHINGTON – Impeachment may have been the business of the day on Capitol Hill Thursday, but Arizona Sen. Martha McSally’s videotaped brush-off of a CNN reporter as a “liberal hack” was the moment of the day. CNN called McSally’s comment to senior congressional correspondent Manu Raju “unbecoming of a senator.” One media critic said she.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers voted on a straight party line Wednesday to forward two articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump to the Senate for trial, a 228-193 vote as predictable as the arguments for and against it. Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Gilbert, repeated his earlier accusations that the Democratic majority is engaged in “radical, vindictive.

WASHINGTON – Colleagues of Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick offered prayers and well wishes for the Tucson Democrat after she announced Wednesday that she is seeking treatment for alcohol dependence, which she said was to blame for a serious fall last week. Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Tucson, applauded Kirkpatrick in a tweet “for this courageous step, and look.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers split along party lines Thursday as the House passed a nonbinding resolution calling on the president to end the use of U.S. military “to engage in hostilities in or against Iran or any part of its government or military.” The 224-194 vote saw a handful of lawmakers cross the aisle, but.

TUCSON – A warm breeze blew past Colleen Coyle Mathis and her husband, Christopher, as they lounged on the back porch of their Spanish Colonial Revival-style house one evening last fall, drinking bottles of Pacifico. Marigold, their 2-year-old Bernese mountain dog, lay at their feet, and the music of Linda Ronstadt hummed in the background..

WASHINGTON – The only things certain in life are death, taxes – and, for the last six decades, that Arizona would gain seats in Congress. That streak is almost certain to continue in 2020, when the census is expected to show the state has added enough new residents over the last 10 years to add.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Census Bureau wants you – specifically 57,000 of you, the number of Arizonans needed to fill jobs in the state for the 2020 decennial census. It’s part of a push to hire 500,000 workers nationwide, mostly for census takers who will go door to door, but also for clerical, supervisory and.

WASHINGTON – Even as it was losing the fight to put a citizenship question on the 2020 Census, the bureau was running tests last summer that it now claims show the question would not have affected response rates. That finding will not affect the 2020 Census, but advocates say it is a distraction they don’t.

WASHINGTON – The late Sen. John McCain combined leadership positions that came from almost four decades in Congress with a flair for the media spotlight – as one analyst noted, the Arizona Republican was typically “unavoidable for comment.” The current Arizona delegation has nowhere near the tenure or clout of McCain. But between them they.

TIJUANA, Baja California, Mexico – In a neighborhood just south of San Diego stands a narrow, two-story home connected to a tire shop. It’s where U.S. military veterans go after the country they served deports them and there’s nowhere else to turn. The men and women it serves call the place the Bunker. Officially known.

WASHINGTON – The $1.4 trillion budget that Congress passed last week contained $1.375 billion for border wall construction in fiscal 2020 – what one expert called a “mixed bag” in which neither side got all it wanted. The funding, rolled into a must-pass Defense spending bill before lawmakers left town for their holiday recess, was.

WASHINGTON – The House vote to impeach President Donald Trump was just minutes old when the emails started flying – impeachment supporters had aligned themselves with “socialist Democrats,” while Trump supporters had “spinelessly” caved to the president. The emails, from the national political parties, were directed at the three House incumbents from Arizona whose seats.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers split along party lines Wednesday as the House took a historic vote to impeach President Donald Trump, making him just the third president to be impeached and the first while facing re-election. After months of hearings and a daylong debate, the House voted 230-197 to find Trump guilty of abuse of.

WASHINGTON – With an impeachment vote looming, members of Arizona’s congressional delegation faced town hall meetings with constituents torn on the issue and office correspondence that included the occasional death threat. That was not this week’s expected House vote on articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump, but the vote 21 years ago on the.

WASHINGTON – Bureau of Land Management employees in Washington have until this week to decide whether to accept a transfer out West – a move that some advocates and former bureau managers see as an attempt at “dismantling” the agency. Notices went out Nov. 12 to 159 workers who will be affected by the bureau’s.

PHOENIX – Democrats allege the design of Arizona ballots puts their candidates at an unconstitutional disadvantage, according to a lawsuit filed last month against Arizona’s Secretary of State. The suit takes issue with ballots in partisan races that routinely list Republican candidates before Democrats, and it recommends rotating ballot order to ensure no candidate has.

PHOENIX – Climate change protesters gathered Friday afternoon in Phoenix and other Arizona cities, continuing the #FridaysforFuture climate strikes inspired by Greta Thunberg, who has reached international recognition since demanding action before Sweden’s parliament at age 15. After a global climate strike in September, local group AZ Youth Climate Strike sought to keep the momentum..

WINDOW ROCK – The Navajo Nation Reservation spans 27,000 square miles across parts of Arizona, Utah and New Mexico. The land, with its deep canyons, towering spires and wide mesas, is just as diverse as the more than 156,000 people who call it home. Life and news here move at a different pace. “There is.

WASHINGTON – The House Judiciary Committee ended a daylong hearing into possible articles of impeachment Wednesday against President Donald Trump with bitter partisan sparring. The eight-hour hearing included testimony from four constitutional scholars on whether they believe Trump’s actions warranted an impeachment under the Constitution. Democrats repeatedly invoked the Constitution and set up softball questions.

WASHINGTON – Impeachment. Immigration. Investigations. Campaigning already for the 2020 elections. With all the chaos going on in Washington, it might seem like there’s not a lot to be thankful for. Which may be why Arizona lawmakers’ thoughts turned to home when they were asked what they would be thankful for this holiday. “I’m so.

PHOENIX – A new state poll shows a yawning divide among Republicans and Democrats on key Arizona issues, including immigration, climate change, housing affordability and gun control. But registered independents may well become a deciding factor in the 2020 elections, according to a poll by the ASU Morrison Institute for Public Policy. About 35% of.

PHOENIX – Dozens of spectators, some as young as 9, crowded into City Hall this month to meet Victoria, one of the most complete Tyrannosaurus rex fossils uncovered to date. To oohs and aahs, Mayor Kate Gallego unveiled the dinosaur’s enormous skull in a world premiere, ahead of an exhibition that runs through May 25.

WASHINGTON – Two months of investigation and two weeks of televised hearings do not appear to have changed any minds in Arizona’s congressional delegation about the potential impeachment of President Donald Trump. The proceedings seem instead to have cemented the opinions of each side, with Republicans calling it an unfair process and Democrats saying the.

WASHINGTON – A House committee gave preliminary approval Wednesday to a comprehensive marijuana reform bill that would decriminalize the drug while erasing pot convictions stretching back decades. The vote by the House Judiciary Committee came the same day that a new poll showed a slim majority of Arizonans support legalization of marijuana for recreational use.

WASHINGTON – Former McCain Institute Executive Director Kurt Volker told the House Intelligence Committee Tuesday that he was unaware of any efforts to get the Ukrainian government to interfere in U.S. politics in exchange for military aid. Volker, the former U.S. special envoy to Ukraine, told the panel conducting an impeachment inquiry into President Donald.

WASHINGTON – Tribal leaders went before Congress Tuesday to demand the government address longstanding problems in Indian Country – and not for the first time. They were among the witnesses at a House hearing on “Broken Promises,” a U.S. Commission on Civil Rights report detailing decades of underfunding, poor data collection and lack of coordination.

WASHINGTON – Hispanics are expected to be the largest bloc of minority voters by the 2020 elections, but advocates say those numbers will be of little use if potential voters aren’t motivated to turn out at the polls. That’s why they announced plans Thursday for a multimillion-dollar campaign focused on five states, including Arizona, that.

WASHINGTON – The much-anticipated first day of open House impeachment hearings arrived Wednesday with none of the drama of recent high-profile events like the Kavanaugh confirmation, with one Arizona lawmaker describing the hearing as “pretty dry.” That sentiment appeared to be shared at bars around D.C. that opened Wednesday morning and tuned the TVs to.

WASHINGTON – The Democratic National Committee confirmed this week that Arizona is one of eight battleground states it has targeted for the 2020 elections, already hiring organizers in the state and focusing on suburban and Latino voters. DNC officials said in a briefing Thursday that the shifting demographics in Arizona, its growing Latino population and.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump boasted Wednesday about the record 158 federal judges that have been confirmed under his watch, with dozens more to come as he carries through on a campaign promise to remake federal courts. The announcement came as Trump nominated 10 more judges, including one for the U.S. District Court for Arizona,.

TUCSON – Voters on Tuesday overwhelmingly defeated Proposition 205, which would have declared Tucson the state’s first sanctuary city. The vote came amid warnings from the Trump administration of possible federal sanctions costing the city millions of dollars. More than 70% of voters said no to the proposition in Arizona’s second-largest city, known for its.

PHOENIX – Tuesday marked 52 weeks until voters will elect a commander-in-chief, all 435 members of Congress and 33 of 100 senators. But for the first time since Bill Clinton won re-election in 1996, pundits aren’t sure whether Arizona will vote red or blue. Mike Noble, chief of research and managing partner at OH Predictive.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers split on party lines Thursday as the House passed a resolution that lays out the framework for the next public phase of the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump. The 232-196 vote followed two hours of fiery debate, in which Republicans like Peoria Rep. Debbie Lesko called the resolution a “total.

PHOENIX – A boom in manufacturing in Arizona – from electric cars to high-end golf clubs – is helping to lower unemployment in the U.S., Gov. Doug Ducey told business leaders this week, noting that manufacturing jobs in the state now outnumber construction jobs. Ducey, joined by Tom Gilman, an assistant secretary of the U.S..

WASHINGTON – The acting director of Citizenship and Immigration Services insisted to a House panel that there are no new plans to end “medical deferred action,” but Democrats called the administration “cruel” for considering the notion in the first place. Wednesday’s House Oversight Committee hearing came nearly two months after USCIS reversed its plan to.

PHOENIX – “How do you feel knowing that someone died because of one dollar?” Arizona Corporation Commissioner Sandra Kennedy asked that question of Donald Brandt, chief executive of utility company Arizona Public Service, as he sat at before the commission. APS has been under public scrutiny since the Phoenix New Times broke a story in.

WASHINGTON – One official called it fitting: The military operation that tracked down and killed the leader of the Islamic State this weekend was named for Kayla Mueller, a Prescott native who was killed while being held by that group in Syria in 2015. Operation Kayla Mueller led to the death of IS leader Abu.

WASHINGTON – Arizona joined 46 other states and territories this week in antitrust investigation of Facebook, including whether the social media giant violated consumer data privacy and whether it is a monopoly that has driven up advertising prices and suppressed competition. Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich said Tuesday that he joined the investigation being spearheaded.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers were among dozens of Republicans who stormed the House impeachment hearings Wednesday to protest the closed-door meetings and demand that Democrats open the proceedings. The action brought an abrupt halt to the deposition of Deputy Assistant Defense Secretary Laura Cooper, who was about to testify in the House’s inquiry into a.

WASHINGTON – More than three months into the school year, Chinle Unified School District still has teaching vacancies to fill and many of the teachers it does have on payroll do not have a standard teaching certificate. But that’s better than it was at the start of the year, and Chinle Associate Superintendent Doug Clauschee.

PHOENIX – Federal officials are determined to recruit workers and accurately count residents for the 2020 census, especially such historically underserved minorities as Native Americans and Hispanics, census leaders said Tuesday. “It’s important we hire people in every community in order to have a complete and accurate census,” said Timothy Olson, the Census Bureau’s associate.

WASHINGTON – Running for office has always required determination, funding, a message – and now it apparently requires a book deal. Sen. Martha McSally, R-Ariz., announced a book deal Monday that will put her memoir, “Dare to Fly,” on bookshelves in May, just six months before the election for her Senate seat. She’s not the.

WASHINGTON – Rep. David Schweikert’s campaign fundraising is down sharply against a possible Democratic challenger with a larger warchest, his office is dogged by ethics complaints and he appears to be running what one analyst called a “zombie” campaign. All that combines to make Arizona’s 6th District congressional race competitive and closely watched nationally. But.

WASHINGTON – Retired Phoenix firefighter Mike Lambert stood in a sea of red “Make America Great Again” caps Thursday and shared his opinion on Congress and its impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump. “It’s a joke,” said Lambert, one of several hundred who rallied on the West Lawn of the Capitol to voice their support.

WASHINGTON – The dream of a national museum dedicated to the Latin American experience took one step closer to reality Thursday, as lawmakers and advocates touted a bill that they think has a good chance of putting a museum on the National Mall. A building may still be years away, but advocates said it is.

WASHINGTON – The Senate voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to confirm Arizona businesswoman Barbara Barrett as the next Air Force secretary, one day after brushing aside an attempt to stall her nomination over Air Force use of Trump hotels for official business. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., was unhappy that Barrett refused at her confirmation hearing last month.

WASHINGTON – Three Arizona Republicans held fast with President Donald Trump as the House voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to rebuke the president’s decision to pull U.S. troops out of northern Syria. The 354-60 vote included 129 GOP lawmakers who crossed the aisle to vote with every Democrat in support of the resolution that also called on.

WASHINGTON – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had just announced a formal impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump and the White House whistleblower report was about to drop when Arizona Democrats and Republicans met on a recent morning. Not to fight. But to chat over doughnuts and coffee. It was the latest of what has become.

WASHINGTON – Two weeks after a federal court halted some detainer requests from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Arizona law enforcement agencies say they are still doing business with the agency as usual. A U.S. District judge in Central California ruled last month that ICE requests to hold people based solely on an electronic database of.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers joined a growing bipartisan chorus critical of President Donald Trump’s decision to pull American troops from Northern Syria, even as Trump continued to defend the plan Thursday. Sen. Martha McSally is one of several Republicans – including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell – who this week called the move short-sighted, saying it.

WASHINGTON – Congress returns next week from a two-week recess, a time when lawmakers can go home and meet with voters – except that many of them don’t. A report by the Town Hall Project found that Arizona lawmakers have held just 28 town halls so far this year – and 19 of those were.

WASHINGTON – Border officers apprehended nearly 1 million migrants at the southern border in fiscal 2019, an 88 percent increase over the previous year, according to Customs and Border Protection numbers released Tuesday. Acting CBP Commissioner Mark Morgan said at a White House press briefing that the “staggering” increase was one that “no immigration system.

CASA GRANDE – Arizona Republicans opposed to an impeachment inquiry into President Trump on Tuesday joined a nationwide protest of Democratic members of Congress, saying it was time to “stop the madness.” “We want them to stop the insanity, we want our state to focus on governing,” said Trump supporter Glenda Bird, who was among.

WASHINGTON – Three days after he told staff at the McCain Institute that he was still their executive director, Kurt Volker resigned Monday because his role in a House impeachment inquiry “risks becoming a distraction” to the institute’s work. Arizona State University President Michael Crow praised Volker’s “service guiding this important university initiative” and said.

Updated Monday, Oct. 7 at 12:30 p.m. WASHINGTON – Three days after he told staff at the McCain Institute that he was still their executive director, Kurt Volker resigned Monday because his role in a House impeachment inquiry “risks becoming a distraction” to the work of the institute. Volker’s future with the institute was called.

Leer en español PHOENIX – The neon “Open” sign in the window casts a weak glow across La Olmeca, which is quiet except for a couple of diners. Georgia Martínez rushes from the kitchen, where a TV is tuned to a Spanish sports channel, to bring beers and plates of Mexican food to the tables..

WASHINGTON – To President Donald Trump, the White House whistleblower who reported concerns about his call with the Ukrainian president is comparable to a spy and a traitor. To Marianne Jennings, whistleblowers aren’t sinners – but they aren’t always saints, either. Jennings, an Arizona State University professor of business ethics and an expert in corporate.

WASHINGTON – Democrats have a 38-seat advantage in the House, where San Francisco liberal Nancy Pelosi has regained the speaker’s gavel and announced a formal impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump. Three House committees are aggressively pursuing charges that Trump misused his office for political purposes and the president has fired back by suggesting that.

WASHINGTON – Arizona has long been at the forefront of the school voucher and school choice movement, but State Treasurer Kimberly Yee told a Washington audience Tuesday that more needs to be done. Yee was among officials from several states who joined Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and White House Senior Counselor Kellyanne Conway to promote.

PHOENIX – The voting rights of Native Americans in Arizona are routinely suppressed by a slew of requirements and practices, such as photo ID laws and a scarcity of polling places, Navajo and Gila River leaders said Tuesday at a congressional hearing in Phoenix. “If someone from the Navajo Nation submits a ballot on Election.

WASHINGTON – Arizona businesswoman Barbara Barrett’s nomination to be Air Force secretary is expected to proceed without incident when the Senate returns from its two-week recess, despite concerns of one Senate Democrat who had threatened to hold it up. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., was unsatisfied with Barrett’s answer when he asked if she would prohibit.

WASHINGTON – Kurt Volker is still serving as executive director of the McCain Institute, after resigning as U.S. special envoy for Ukraine when his name surfaced last week in a whistleblower’s report on President Donald Trump’s dealings with that country. Volker’s resignation, first reported by The State Press at Arizona State University, came after he.

PHOENIX – Immigration officials are not the “bad guys” trying to make the lives of law-abiding immigrants miserable but are going after undocumented immigrants who commit crimes, an Arizona Immigration and Customs Enforcement official said Friday. “We’re human ourselves,” said Albert Carter, acting field office director for ICE enforcement removal operations in Phoenix. “We have.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers split on party lines this week as Congress voted again to terminate President Donald Trump’s declaration of a national emergency at the border, which he has cited to justify use of Pentagon funds for border construction. The resolution passed by the Senate Wednesday and the House Friday is virtually identical to.

WASHINGTON – State Rep. Jennifer Longdon, D-Phoenix, didn’t need to tell congressional lawmakers Thursday about the harm firearms can do: She showed them, when she rolled her wheelchair into a House hearing on the costs of gun violence. Longdon is paralyzed from the chest down, and her ex-fiancé lives with brain trauma and blindness, after.

WASHINGTON – Refugee organizations in Arizona and nationally said they were disappointed, but not surprised, at a Trump administration plan to reduce the number of refugees admitted to the U.S. to the lowest level in modern history next year. White House officials announced late Thursday that the administration was proposing to cap the number of.

PHOENIX – As dusk fell Wednesday, activists with March for Our Lives Arizona placed sandals and shoes of people touched by gun violence at the base of the “Release the Fear” statue, cast from old firearms. “After the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting, it was time for me to step up and do something,” said Josie.

WASHINGTON – Arizonans on opposite sides of the immigration debate were in Washington Wednesday where they rallied on opposite sides of the Capitol in hopes of making their respective cases to Congress. On the West Front, Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb joined close to 200 other sheriffs, lawmakers and “angel families” to say the U.S..

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers agreed Wednesday that President Donald Trump must turn over documents in the latest probe of his administration, even as they disagreed on what those documents mean and how the investigation should proceed. After hours of bitter partisan debate, the House voted 421-0 Wednesday to demand that the White House release the.

WASHINGTON – State officials agree on this much: “Not one red penny” of the $150,000 allocated for a task force on missing and murdered indigenous women that was created in May has been seen yet. But they disagree on who’s to blame. Arizona Sens. Jamescita Peshlakai and Sally Ann Gonzales, in Washington this week for.

WASHINGTON – Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Tuesday that the House would open a formal impeachment inquiry on President Donald Trump, but her announcement did not appear to change any minds in the Arizona delegation. All four House Republicans repeated their vociferous opposition to the “baseless” inquiry, while four of the state’s five House Democrats who.

WASHINGTON – Arizona schools started this academic year with 21% of all teaching positions vacant, and nearly half of the teachers who were on the payroll did not meet the state’s certification standards. And that was an improvement from last year. Those are the findings of an Arizona School Personnel Administrators Association survey of 150.

WASHINGTON – The number of Arizonans without health insurance rose by about 55,000 people last year, according to new data from the Census Bureau, as a relatively strong economy was offset by hefty cost increases for coverage. The change from 2017 to 2018 raised the total number of uninsured in the state last year to.

WASHINGTON – An intraparty threat to censure Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is on hold for now, but progressives who called for the vote said they achieved their goal of putting the freshman Democrat on notice over her voting record. A censure vote could have come up as early as this weekend’s meeting of the Arizona.

WASHINGTON – Officials at a forum on human trafficking said Arizona is “leading at the state level” on prevention, but warned that people need to remain vigilant to what one speaker called a trafficking “epidemic” in the state. The remarks from Sen. Martha McSally, R-Ariz., and Cindy McCain, widow of former Sen. John McCain and.

WASHINGTON – An inspector general’s report on the mental health of migrant children in federal detention found multiple shortcomings in how officials cared for children in custody last fall, with significant trauma and worsening mental health problems. Four Arizona detention facilities were among those surveyed for the report, which pointed to a shortage of clinicians,.

WASHINGTON – Tribal representatives told a Senate committee Wednesday that the Federal Communications Commission is not doing enough to ease the regulatory burdens that keep Indian Country from getting wireless broadband access. The hearing before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee was in response to a November Government Accountability Office report that highlighted the barriers tribes.

WASHINGTON – A Phoenix business owner told House members Wednesday that the Small Business Administration is doing a better job of giving minority-owned, small businesses a leg up, but that the agency still needs to improve. The comments by Fortis Networks CEO Clarence McAllister echoed those of other witnesses at a House Small Business Committee.

WASHINGTON – A new report claims that Arizona loses as much as $1.9 billion every year to costs directly associated with gun violence, from lost wages to expenses on everything from health care to police and criminal justice. That number balloons to $5.4 billion when indirect costs, such as the “reduced quality of life attributable.

WASHINGTON – A congressional attempt to salvage a foundering student loan forgiveness program was only marginally better, with just 4% of Arizona applications approved in the second round – and that was four times better than the national rate. The Government Accountability Office reported this month the same confusing guidelines and lack of communication in.

WASHINGTON – The Arizona Supreme Court Monday sided with two Phoenix women who said a city law aimed at preventing discrimination would have forced them to violate their Christian faith by creating custom invitations for same-sex weddings. A narrow majority of the court said that the religious convictions of Brush & Nib owners Joanna Duka.

WASHINGTON – Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey joined business leaders in Washington on Monday to push for final approval of the “critical” U.S.-Mexico-Canada agreement and protect trade that is worth billions in trade to the state. Ducey and Arizona Chamber of Commerce President Glenn Hamer, speaking to a meeting of U.S. Chamber of Commerce members from.

WASHINGTON – Farming, real estate and manufacturing representatives stood and applauded as Army and Environmental Protection Agency officials formally signed documents this week to repeal an Obama-era rule that greatly expanded waters that are subject to federal regulation. But while some welcomed the end of the “Waters of the United States” rule, environmental groups warned.

WASHINGTON – Arizona vape-store owners were alarmed by the Trump administration’s announcement Wednesday that it plans to begin enforcing rules that would drive flavored e-cigarettes out of the market, an industry official said. The surprise White House statement was in response to recent reports that vaping-related lung illnesses have been confirmed in 33 states and.

WASHINGTON – Arizona businesswoman Barbara Barrett might have been the subject of a Senate hearing Thursday on her nomination to be the next Air Force secretary, but it was President Donald Trump who was often the focus. In an otherwise amicable confirmation hearing, some senators pressed Barrett and Ryan McCarthy, the Army secretary nominee at.

WASHINGTON – A House panel worked late into the night in a sometimes heated, sometimes emotional hearing on gun-control bills Tuesday, a potential preview of congressional debates to come in the weeks after a string of mass shootings. And in another preview of what could come, the Democrat-controlled House Judiciary Committee rejected all Republican amendments.

PHOENIX – More than 100 Phoenix first responders, dignitaries and members of the public gathered Wednesday morning at City Hall to commemorate the 18th anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks. The somber, heartfelt memorial included bagpipers playing “Amazing Grace,” displays of structural steel from the World Trade Center and the Flag of Heroes. Among.

WASHINGTON – Advocates reacted with alarm Tuesday to published reports that the Trump administration may again cut the number of refugees allowed in to the U.S., a move they said would endanger vulnerable people and tarnish the country’s standing. President Donald Trump has cut refugee admission limits every year since he took office, from a.

WASHINGTON – Despite repeated failures, Republican leaders rallied Tuesday in support of their latest version of the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, which Rep. Debbie Lesko, R-Peoria, called “the most important bill in Congress.” She was one of a score of GOP lawmakers at an hours-long hearing where lawmakers and health care providers called for.

WASHINGTON – Apprehensions at the southern border dropped sharply in August, to just more than 64,000 people, in part because of increased cooperation from Mexican authorities, a Customs and Border Protection official said Monday. But while apprehensions have fallen by more than half since peaking at 144,255 in May, this August was still higher than.

WASHINGTON – Mesa Mayor John Giles said he has spoken to friends, neighbors and strangers – including many conservatives – who he said support universal background checks on gun purchases, particularly after a string of mass shootings last month. “Frankly, the leaders of our country and our communities need to catch up to where the.

WASHINGTON – Potential challengers to Rep. David Schweikert were quick to jump on new ethics revelations Friday that there was “substantial reason to believe” the Fountain Hills Republican may have used congressional staff and resources to benefit his political campaigns. The allegations were released Thursday by the House Ethics Committee, which was already pursuing a.

WASHINGTON – The Trump Administration violated federal law when it diverted funds for national park improvements toward keeping places like Grand Canyon National Park open during the last government shutdown, the Government Accountability Office said Thursday. The 17-page legal opinion claims the Interior Department’s decision to use park maintenance fees for day-to-day services – including.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s road to renomination could get easier through Arizona, with the state Republican Party signing the paperwork Monday that will let it drop its presidential primary next year. One analyst turned his nose up at state Republicans who “don’t want to go through the process of actually allowing people to vote,”.

WASHINGTON – Two years after the Trump administration announced plans to kill Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, the program still has a pulse – though advocates worry about how long that might last. On Sept. 5, 2017, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced that the Obama-era initiative to protect young immigrants from deportation would be phased.

WASHINGTON – The Navajo Nation Council voted unanimously Thursday to oppose a Trump administration draft plan that critics say could put income restrictions for the first time on applicants to the Indian Home Loan Guarantee Program. The Department of Housing and Urban Development proposal would limit participation in the program to those making 115% of.

WASHINGTON – Hunting groups are applauding new federal rules creating longer seasons, extended hours and expanded methods for hunting and taking different types of game on national wildlife refuges. The changes, announced last week by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, affect 1.4 million acres of federal land, more than 800,000 of which are in.

PHOENIX – Some in the audience snapped their fingers, showing approval of a politician’s words on gun violence. At times, some gasped. An audience of young and older, racially and ethnically diverse, came to a recent town hall to listen to ways to stop gun violence, particularly in communities of color. Congressional candidates and members.

WASHINGTON – Border construction near Yuma will receive almost $1.3 billion of the $3.6 billion the Defense Department said it will divert from planned military projects under the national border emergency declared in February by President Donald Trump. Among the 127 Pentagon projects scheduled to lose funding this year for Trump’s border construction push is.

WASHINGTON – Arizona will get more than $20 million in State Opioid Response grant funds from the federal government, part of $1.8 billion in grants the Trump administration said it was releasing to states Wednesday. The grants, now in their second year, are designed to give states the flexibility to “meet the needs of their.

WASHINGTON – Phoenix and 11 other Arizona police departments are among more than 400 in the U.S. that have partnered with video-doorbell maker Ring to connect authorities with homeowners who use the company’s technology. Some privacy advocates have raised concerns that the program could give police “access to essentially a networked” closed-circuit TV of communities..

WASHINGTON – When the state’s new universal licensing recognition law took effect last week, the Arizona Board of Behavioral Health Examiners was ready. The board had “over 40 applications pending prior to the application date, waiting to be granted on the first day,” said Emily Rajakovich, the director of boards and communications in Gov. Doug.

WASHINGTON – Arizona business leaders said they worry that a 15% tariff on $300 billion in Chinese goods that takes effect Sunday will backfire and end up hurting economic growth at home. The new tariffs are set to be imposed on more than 6,000 items but will fall largely on consumer goods, according to the.

WASHINGTON – Time is running out for Navajo landowners who want to take part in the second round of a $1.9 billion federal program to buy back scattered and isolated parcels of land on the Navajo Nation. Friday was the last day for some owners of Navajo land in New Mexico to apply for a.

WASHINGTON – Arizona’s Senate race, already expected to be one of the toughest in the nation, got tougher this week when a Phoenix businessman announced a Republican primary challenge to incumbent Sen. Martha McSally. Longtime GOP donor and Trump supporter Daniel McCarthy said Wednesday that he will run against McSally, a first-term senator appointed to.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers suspended a Clean Water Act permit for the proposed Rosemont Mine site in southern Arizona, the latest development in more than a decade of legal challenges from tribes and environmental groups. The Aug. 23 decision by the Corps followed a July 31 court ruling that found the.

WASHINGTON – Officials called a $20 million grant for suicide prevention programs in state schools an important first step to deal with a growing problem, even as they said much more needs to be done. The Arizona Board of Education on Monday approved a $20 million plan to hire additional counselors, social workers or school.

WASHINGTON – The Trump administration has long complained about the Flores agreement, a 1997 court ruling that severely limits the amount of time that migrant children can be detained by the government. In theory, getting rid of the decades-old policy that the administration calls an immigration law “loophole” that incentivizes border crossing and forces family.

Updated Thursday at 5 p.m. PHOENIX – Three extensions of the Valley Metro light rail system will move forward after voters rejected Proposition 105, which would have halted the expansion. With 185,852 votes tallied, unofficial returns showed Prop 105 trailing 63% to 37%. Phoenix voters on Tuesday also shot down Proposition 106, which would have.

WASHINGTON – As state and Flagstaff officials battle over who should bear the cost of the city’s higher minimum wage, service providers for people with disabilities say they feel caught in the crossfire. Under a law that took effect Tuesday, the state can charge Flagstaff for added costs to state contracts that result from the.

WASHINGTON – On any given day in the past year, about six people have stopped by the U.S. Naval Academy visitor’s center to ask about John McCain’s gravesite, where they have left everything from flowers to flags to miniature liquor bottles. The mementos are just one way the longtime Arizona Republican senator has been remembered.

WASHINGTON – A federal appeals court Monday upheld a lower court’s finding that Colorado City had been run as an extension of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, violating nonmembers’ rights in the process. The Justice Department successfully sued the Arizona town for civil rights violations after finding that local utilities.

PHOENIX – A preschooler reportedly takes a doll from a dollar store. Police surround her parents’ vehicle in a sun-soaked parking lot, guns drawn. One officer threatens, with an expletive, to shoot. A head is slammed against a police car; legs are kicked apart. Onlookers videotape the scene, murmuring disapproval. A video goes viral. Changes.

BONDURANT, Wyo. – Marlene “Lanie” Beebe stood in a pair of slippers, surrounded by scorched trees. A long gravel road led to rubble: shards of pottery, doll heads and a blackened metal chair. That’s where her neighbor, Nikki Cowley, said she found Beebe one day, among the remnants of 20 years in her home. The.

SHINGLETOWN, Calif. – Unless it’s Sunday, Kelly Loew is steering her rusty-red Jeep down the same mail route in Shingletown, as she has six days a week for the last seven years. But she delivers less mail these days as California’s persistent wildfires drive residents away. Last year, California experienced its deadliest and most destructive.

PHOENIX – The City of Goodyear was faced with a difficult decision: publicly disagree with the state’s governor, or potentially lose out on 500 new jobs for its community. The outrage that had consumed the nation surrounding Nike’s pulling of what some perceived as an offensive shoe had reached the quiet suburb, and Mayor Georgia.

PHOENIX – The Police Department continued its rollout of body-worn cameras Wednesday, issuing the devices to about a dozen officers in the Cactus Park Precinct in north Phoenix. The department’s goal of providing body cams to 2,000 first responders by Aug. 12 now is almost halfway completed, authorities said. At the rollout, Sgt. Kevin Johnson.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump vowed Wednesday that his administration is “absolutely moving forward” with a push to include a citizenship question on the 2020 Census, just hours after the Census Bureau said it would not do so. The apparent reversal was dismissed by advocates as a “scare tactic” by the president aimed at keeping.

PHOENIX – Phoenix will take steps to collect and analyze data on police performance, the City Council decided Tuesday. As it works to bolster public accountability, the council also is considering a survey to measure public attitudes toward police and a civilian oversight board. A data-tracking system could work as an early-detection for police conduct,.

Updated at 5:30 p.m. PHOENIX – The dozens of protesters gathered outside the office of Arizona Rep. Greg Stanton’s office on Tuesday said they have seen enough of how officials treat migrants at detention centers. “It is a humanitarian crisis,” protester Hannah Pynn said. “And when children are crying out for their mothers and they’re.

WASHINGTON – Arizona Reps. Andy Biggs, R-Gilbert, and Ruben Gallego, D-Phoenix, don’t often find themselves on the same side of an issue. But they were among the 102 House members who voted against an emergency border funding bill Thursday, a vote that scrambled the nearly party-line vote of just two days earlier on a Democrat-backed.

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court handed a temporary victory Thursday to opponents of a citizenship question on the 2020 Census, saying the government will have to go back and make a better case in lower courts if it wants to include the question. That could be difficult for the Census Bureau, which had said that.

WASHINGTON – Arizona representatives split down party lines Tuesday as the House approved $4.5 billion in emergency border funding, setting up a showdown with the Senate which passed its own version of the measure Wednesday. The votes come as federal officials say they could be just days away from running out of money to handle.

PHOENIX – Attorneys with Jeff Anderson & Associates released a report Wednesday containing the names, photos and information of 109 clergy accused of sexual abuse in the Diocese of Phoenix. “It is time for transparency, and it is time for disclosure,” said Jeff Anderson, whose law firm advocates for victims of clergy sexual abuse. “The.

PHOENIX – Months after glitches at the polls led to long waits for voters, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors on Wednesday approved a $6.1 million contract to update the vote-counting system and establish an executive position they said will smooth future balloting. “One’s right to vote is sacrosanct,” Supervisor Steve Chucri said. “I think.

PHOENIX – Demonstrators rallied Wednesday outside City Hall and later addressed the City Council to show support for police in the wake of recent outrage over a viral video of a controversial police stop for suspected shoplifting. “It’s our turn,” organizer Nohl Rosen said Wednesday. “There is a war on police in this country. We.

WASHINGTON – Tribal members, environmentalists and lawmakers told a House panel Tuesday that including uranium on a list of “critical minerals” opens the door to expedited mining that will put tribal lands and national parks at risk. They were responding to a Trump administration announcement earlier this month that directed the government to locate uranium.

PHOENIX – The State of Arizona Acupuncture Board of Examiners has entered the fight against opioid abuse, approving chemical dependency programs for a form of acupuncture that involves the outer ear. Supporters say auricular acupuncture helps people break free of addiction, but a skeptic says there’s zero evidence acupuncture relieves any condition. “I don’t think.

WASHINGTON – Former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords joined Democratic congressional leaders Thursday to demand that the Senate allow a vote on a bill that toughens background checks for gun purchasers. It is the third time this year that Giffords – who was severely injured in a 2011 shooting in Tucson – has been to Capitol.

WASHINGTON – The head of the Arizona National Guard defended the use of military troops on the border Thursday, saying their support puts more Border Patrol officers on the front lines – what one official called “badges back to the border.” “We support Customs and Border Protection by moving agents around, helping them with humanitarian.

PHOENIX – Environmentalists gathered Tuesday outside Sen. Martha McSally’s office to demand she support legislation requiring the U.S. to honor the Paris climate accord, from which the Trump administration intends to withdraw. “We’re sending a message to Senator McSally that we would like her to act on climate,” said Sandy Bahr, director of the Sierra.

PHOENIX – One by one, members of the community stepped up to the microphone at the City Council meeting, some trembling and angry. They gave voice to their experiences, talking of police encounters that didn’t end well. They asked for accountability, such as increased use of body cameras, better training, vetting of recruits and an.

PHOENIX – A community meeting intended to quell the bubbling anger over a viral video involving two Phoenix police officers grew contentious Tuesday night but ended with a promise: “We can do better.” Mayor Kate Gallego concluded the nearly three-hour meeting with a short statement, telling the hundreds who remained at Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church.

WASHINGTON – A Coconino County official urged lawmakers Tuesday to “make sure the federal government meets its responsibility” of maintaining national parks, which face almost $12 billion in needed upkeep – $313.8 million in the Grand Canyon alone. Coconino County Supervisor Liz Archuleta told the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee that local officials have.

PHOENIX – President Donald Trump’s pledge to have federal authorities remove millions of undocumented immigrants from the country beginning next week set off a flurry of warnings from immigration advocates to prepare families for possible deportation. U.S. Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona said Tuesday that 2 million may face deportation, a move he supports. Trump.

PHOENIX – A Phoenix couple held at police gunpoint after their 4-year-old daughter allegedly shoplifted from a dollar store said Monday the city hasn’t done enough to make up for the terrifying incident, despite apologies by the mayor and chief of police. Dravon Ames and Iesha Harper spoke publicly after announcing last week they plan.

WASHINGTON – Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Tucson, said he expects “full vindication” after the House Ethics Committee’s request for documents involving four-year-old allegations of a hostile workplace in his congressional office. The request this month makes Grijalva the second Arizona lawmaker being looked at by the committee. The panel has been investigating claims for more than.

PHOENIX – Arizona scrapes along the bottom of the nation in children’s well-being, ranking 46th in 2019 Kids Count data released Monday. Lack of affordable housing emerged as a pressure point. Arizona dropped one place from last year in the annual report on states. But child advocates often have called out Arizona for low rankings.

WASHINGTON – Gov. Doug Ducey touted Arizona’s first-in-the-nation universal licensing recognition law at the White House Thursday to a receptive audience of governors and the president, who were there to talk about workforce mobility. Ducey, sitting to President Donald Trump’s immediate left at a large table in the Cabinet Room, said the state’s universal licensing.

PHOENIX – Undocumented immigration from Mexico has dropped so significantly over a decade that Mexicans no longer make up the majority of those living in the U.S. illegally, according to a Pew Research Center report. Mexicans make up less than half the total undocumented immigrant population for the first time in more than half a.

WASHINGTON – A Pima County supervisor told lawmakers Wednesday that a plan to limit the so-called Waters of the United States rule would end up eliminating clean-water protections for “rivers like the Santa Cruz, the Salt, the Gila.” Pima Supervisor Richard Elias told the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee that states like Arizona need.

SACATON – More than four in five Native American women will experience violence in their lifetime, according to one federal study. In another report, Arizona ranked third in missing indigenous women and girls. Those statistics are part of the reason federal officials met Tuesday with tribal leaders in Sacaton on the Gila River Indian Community..

PHOENIX – The trial of No More Deaths volunteer Scott Warren ended Tuesday without a verdict. Warren faced 20 years behind bars on charges of conspiring to transport and harbor two undocumented immigrants he encountered in the desert of southern Arizona last year. Judge Raner C. Collins of the U.S. District Court in Tucson declared.

PHOENIX – A national outbreak of hepatitis A, which can cause nausea, jaundice and, in rare cases, kill, is sweeping through the state, Arizona health officials reported. Two people have died of the liver disease in Arizona. Since November, 353 cases have been reported, according to the Arizona Department of Health Services. Nearly 90 of.

PHOENIX – The more than 500,000 military veterans in Arizona now have greater access to health care options beyond those available from the Department of Veterans Affairs. A nationwide program that took effect Thursday expands the circumstances under which veterans can access care outside the VA system. “It’s going to allow veterans to access the.

WASHINGTON – The number of migrants apprehended at the southern border surged to 144,278 in May, bringing the total for the first eight months of fiscal 2019 to 676,315, already more than any full year in the last decade. More than 20,000 of those apprehensions were in Arizona, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection,.

PHOENIX – Federal judges are weighing whether the U.S. can be held legally responsible for failing to protect future generations from climate change. That’s at the heart of Juliana v. United States, in which 21 young people from around the country claim they have a constitutional right to be protected from man-made climate change. In.

WASHINGTON – Tribal and environmental officials urged House lawmakers Wednesday to protect sacred land and natural resources by supporting a permanent ban on mining on just over 1 million acres around the Grand Canyon. The “Grand Canyon Centennial Protection Act” would prohibit all mining in the affected area, but supporters were focused on the uranium.

WASHINGTON – The House voted mostly on party lines Tuesday to approve a bill that would protect millions of “Dreamers” from deportation and give them a pathway to citizenship, a bill Republicans said would only lead to more illegal immigration. Just seven Republicans crossed the aisle to vote for the bill, which passed Tuesday evening.

TUCSON – The trial of No More Deaths volunteer Scott Warren began Wednesday with the prosecutor asserting that federal authorities are not targeting humanitarian aid along the border with Mexico. “No More Deaths is not on trial,” Nathaniel Walters told the jury. “Scott Warren is.” In his opening statement, however, defense attorney Gregory Kuykendall said.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers did not appear to be swayed Wednesday by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s careful recap of his investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, with both Democrats and Republicans digging in to previous positions. Mueller’s 9-minute statement at the Justice Department said his two-year investigation found “multiple, systematic efforts to interfere”.

PHOENIX – Arizona’s $11.8 billion budget for fiscal 2020, which was passed late Monday only after Republican lawmakers demanded changes to child sex-abuse laws, includes money for schools, infrastructure and health care. But other measures, including one that would have funded pregnancy crisis centers, were left out. The main source of the last-minute conflict was.

WASHINGTON – New Census Bureau figures show that per-pupil spending in Arizona’s public schools was fourth-lowest in the nation in 2017, hampering the state’s efforts in recent years to improve education funding. The report this week said Arizona spent $8,003 per student in fiscal 2017, well below the national average of $12,200 that year and.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump this week approved a disaster declaration for the Navajo Nation in the wake of a February storm that dumped snow on the reservation, isolating some communities and leading to flooding. The declaration, signed Wednesday, is the first step in a process that will let the tribal government seek Federal Emergency.

WASHINGTON – Buckeye posted the fastest growth rate among cities in the nation last year, while Phoenix held the top spot for the size of its overall growth, according to new numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau. The report, released Thursday, said Buckeye added 5,813 residents, an increase of 8.5% in just a year, while.

PHOENIX – Clay Hollinshed found himself sleeping under the stars in a community park near Grand Canyon University in west Phoenix this past winter. But he wasn’t afraid. “I felt free,” he said, beaming ear to ear, his curly hair peeking out from inside the white bandana attempting to hold it in place. He had.

ELOY – Sit. Down. Wait. More than a dozen inmates at Saguaro Correctional Center in Eloy spend their days working with former racing greyhounds to understand these commands. They’re part of a unique program that allows the inmates at the private prison to rehabilitate and train the canines and prepare the dogs to go home.

MESA – A cacophony of voices speaking in Spanish, interspersed with laughter, fills a classroom at Rhodes Junior High School. Some students speak halting English, but on occasion they attempt to translate for students who don’t speak any. As the students try to type short paragraphs describing a time when they experienced conflicting emotions, several.

PHOENIX – Every January, volunteers fan out across Maricopa County to conduct the Point-in-Time homeless count in hopes of learning about challenges faced by people who lack shelter. But this year, a new question was added to the survey: “How many pets did you have sleeping with you last night?” Shanate Smith, a coordinator for.

WASHINGTON – Students will soon be flocking to summer internships, but those headed to Capitol Hill could see something interns there haven’t seen in decades – a little pay for the long hours and high costs of living in Washington. A budget bill funding fiscal 2019 operations for a number of agencies, including Congress, set.

WASHINGTON – The federal government promised college students in 2007 that if they took their degrees and went into a public service profession, they could apply to have whatever student loan debts they still had after 10 years forgiven. So far, the reality has been somewhat different. When the first 29,000 applications were filed with.

WASHINGTON — On a typical day in Arizona this year, more than 3 million robocalls were made to phone numbers in the state, an increase of more than 1.4 million a day from just a year earlier. Despite efforts to block the calls, most of which are illegal, the calls keep coming. And the Federal.

WASHINGTON – Former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio vowed Monday to continue the fight to clear his name of a criminal contempt of court conviction, after the Supreme Court rejected his challenge of an appeals court ruling. “The battle continues, I am not surrendering,” Arpaio said Monday after the high court, without comment, refused to.

WASHINGTON – A divided federal appeals court Friday ruled that a class-action lawsuit over the state’s care of foster children can proceed against the Arizona Department of Child Safety and the state’s Medicaid agency. The suit was filed in 2015 on behalf of 10 children who said that state policies threatened their access to medical.

PHOENIX – Wildlife advocates say animals like the jaguar are at risk if President Donald Trump builds his planned border wall, with one group this week denouncing the administration’s Jaguar Recovery Plan calling it “inadequate.” “This so-called recovery plan won’t do anything to help the jaguar, so the threats to its survival and recovery will.

PHOENIX – Arizona this week became the 48th state to ban drivers from using hand-held cellphones behind the wheel. The law states that in a moving car, the driver is not allowed to operate a cellphone, including to write, send or read any text-based communication. Drivers also aren’t allowed to hold or support a mobile.

PHOENIX – Darby Cline sat on pastel-blue and white blankets spread on the lawn of the Arizona Capitol, bouncing her 4-month-old, Zaliyah Jewell-Borquez, and stretching the infant’s legs. She breastfed her daughter openly, chatting with another woman who sat close by with her child. That’s how it should be done, Cline said. “Apparently, it’s a.

PHOENIX – More than 20 years ago, employees of the Maricopa Association of Governments made projections for ridership numbers for downtown Phoenix’s newest project, the light rail system. Eric Anderson, who’s now executive director for the association, known as MAG, was among those employees who didn’t expect Phoenix would become the fifth largest city in.

WASHINGTON – A new report says Latinos are on track to be the largest minority voting group in 2020, when an estimated 32 million will be eligible to vote. The Latino Vote Project, a collaboration of several advocacy groups, said Thursday that the influence of those voters was already felt in 2018, with “no question”.

PHOENIX – The Arizona Senate voted 18-12 against making lemonade the official drink of the state of Arizona. Some lawmakers voted no because they said there are more important bills to decide. The Legislature is behind schedule and still needs to pass a budget. Other lawmakers took time to debate drinks they said better represent.

WASHINGTON – A border encounter between U.S. and Mexican soldiers earlier this month became a political issue Wednesday when President Donald Trump picked up the incident and threatened to send armed soldiers to the border in response. Trump was reacting to an April 13 incident when a handful of soldiers encountered each other south of.

WASHINGTON – The Department of Homeland Security confirmed Wednesday that it will waive dozens of environmental, health and other laws to clear the way for construction on about 58 miles of border barriers, including 12 miles of fencing near Yuma. The move was quickly attacked by lawmakers and environmental activists, who accused the administration of.

WASHINGTON – Phoenix Bishop Thomas Olmsted said he was honored to be a featured speaker Tuesday at the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast because it gave him a chance to “speak to the Catholics, especially the leaders all across the United States.” And when he spoke, he spoke directly: Olmsted told a packed hotel conference room.

PHOENIX – The road from Washington to St. Petersburg apparently passes through Arizona – at least the cyber-road does. That’s according to the long-awaited Mueller report on the two-year investigation into possible Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. Buried in the 448-page report is a little more than a page that said Russian intelligence.

PHOENIX – Police officials on Friday said a growing number of 911 calls involving people with mental health issues has led to a spike in officer-involved shootings. Mayor Kate Gallego, pointing to a National Police Foundation report on the use of deadly force, called for an increase in mental health services to better serve the.

PHOENIX – Arizona lawmakers looked at the same 448-page Mueller report Thursday and saw two different things, with two very different reactions depending on which side of the aisle they are on. If there was one common thread, it was that nobody’s mind appeared to be changed by the report. The state’s Republicans saw a.

WASHINGTON – The House Ethics Committee on Wednesday released details of its probe of Rep. David Schweikert, R-Fountain Hills, that began last year finding “substantial reason to believe” he may have approved improper office expenditures and campaign contributions. Under committee rules, the original report of the Office of Congressional Ethics had to be released because.

PHOENIX – The Phoenix Police Department is the largest law enforcement agency in Arizona whose officers don’t carry the opioid overdose-reversal drug Narcan, a nasal spray form of naloxone. Officers at other area police departments, including Avondale, Glendale, Goodyear, Mesa, Scottsdale and Surprise, have access to Narcan and are allowed to administer the drug. In.

PHOENIX – Arizona small business owners are fighting for sales tax equality with online retailers, similar to 39 other states trying to collect taxes on goods that consumers buy online. But experts said Arizona’s tax system complicates the situation. A bill in the Legislature would require online retailers who do not have a physical facility.

TEMPE – Officials and experts are exploring a vexing question about the revolving bars of the criminal justice system: How can we stop people from ending back in prison? Arizona has the fourth highest incarceration rate in the country, according to speakers at an Arizona Town Hall earlier this month. The Arizona Department of Corrections.

WASHINGTON – Frontline border officials told a Senate committee Tuesday that the crisis at the southern border is real and that “something has to change” to combat the growing number of migrants arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border. The testimony came as Customs and Border Protection released new numbers that showed apprehensions at the southern border.

WASHINGTON – Two weeks after water officials told Congress there was urgent need to approve the Colorado River drought contingency plan, the House and Senate both passed a plan Monday and sent it to the president’s desk. If signed by President Donald Trump as expected, it would be the culmination of years of negotiations between.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump may have backed off his threat to close the border, but business leaders said Monday there is a very real slowdown in crossings after the redeployment of Customs and Border Protection officers. Then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen last week ordered 750 CBP officers pulled from ports and sent to assist.

ANNAPOLIS, Md. – In a different year, Sen. Martha McSally might not have been on a stage at the U.S. Naval Academy telling college officials that they need to step up and do their part to end sexual assaults on their campuses. That was before this year, when the Arizona Republican shared a secret she.

BUCKEYE – A communitywide campaign to promote seat belt safety among young people, spearheaded by Verrado High School senior Ambar Silverio, could lead to a state law requiring back seat passengers to buckle up. “It’s really hard to pass a bill, and a bill can die for a lot of reasons,” said Erin Eisen, who.

WASHINGTON – To Kit Danley, the solution to the border crisis requires more than just politics: It requires that Americans “choose love instead of fear, and long to see Jesus in the faces of the most vulnerable” who show up at the border. Danley, president of Neighborhood Ministries in Phoenix, made the comments during a.

WASHINGTON – Gov. Doug Ducey gave conditional support Wednesday to a “short as possible” border shutdown, then shifted the blame to Congress which he said has been playing politics with the border issue. Ducey’s comments came after a brief meeting at the White House with President Donald Trump, who threatened last week to close the.

PHOENIX – More than a year has passed since state legislative leaders promised a code of conduct for its members, but the House Ethics Committee still has not produced a code or a policy on sexual harassment. Democratic lawmakers held a press conference Wednesday to urge Speaker of the House Rusty Bowers, R-Mesa, to fulfill.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump repeated threats Monday to deal with a surge of migrants by closing the U.S.- Mexico border, a move that has been called a potential “economic catastrophe” for Arizona. The threat came late last week, as Customs and Border Protection said it had 12,000 immigrants in custody – double what it.

PHOENIX – Sen. Martha McSally reiterated her support for stronger border security at a closed-door roundtable meeting Monday but stopped short of supporting President Donald Trump’s threats to shut down the southern border if Mexico doesn’t stop migrants from entering the United States. She also called on Congress to close “loopholes” that she said have.

PHOENIX – Arizona lawmakers could allow employers to slash the minimum wage for young part-time workers to as low as $7.25 an hour, a measure that drew a contentious crowd of supporters and opponents to a Senate committee hearing Thursday. The Commerce Committee approved House Bill 2523, sending the measure to the full Senate and.

WASHINGTON – Two days after courts removed the last hurdle to a Trump administration ban on transgender military service, the House voted 238-185 Thursday to condemn the ban – but not block it. Arizona lawmakers split along party lines, like most of the House, with Democrats supporting the resolution and Republicans backing the ban, which.

PHOENIX – The case of two Phoenix police officers who were hospitalized this week after accidentally being exposed to a white powder comes as police departments are training officers and changing their policies on how to handle suspicious substances. The unidentified officers were hospitalized Tuesday for a suspected fentanyl exposure, according to media reports. One.

WASHINGTON – The director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources told a Senate panel Wednesday there is an “urgent need” to authorize a multistate drought contingency plan for the Colorado River basin. Tom Buschatzke was one of several state and federal officials pressing Congress on the plan, years in the making, that is designed.

PHOENIX – News of a budget proposal that calls for eliminating funding for the Special Olympics concerns some in Arizona who could be impacted by the cut. “That’s asinine,” said Patrick Becker, the exceptional-student services director for Agua Fria Union High School District. “You’re saying we should only survive off of donations. But that’s not.

WASHINGTON – The “Green New Deal” faced its first test vote in the Senate Tuesday and a renewed round of criticism from Republicans, who called the expansive environmental bill a “Soviet-style takeover” of the economy. That was the description used by Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Prescott, during a Western Caucus news conference where lawmakers said the.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall continued to inch forward this week, as the Democrat-controlled House failed Tuesday to block the border emergency declaration that let the Pentagon approve $1 billion in wall work Monday. The Defense Department said it was tapping a counterdrug activities fund to let the Army Corps of Engineers.

PHOENIX – Lemonade is one step closer to becoming Arizona’s state drink. The Senate Government Committee voted 6-1 to move House Bill 2692, with only Sen. Juan Mendez voting against it. The bill now goes to the Senate Rules Committee and, if passed, the full Senate. Four senators jokingly proposed amendments to change the state.

WASHINGTON – Arizona lawmakers’ reactions to the report on the Mueller investigation were much like the summary itself – open to interpretation depending on which side of the aisle was talking and far from the last word on the topic. While Democrats demanded that the full report be made public, most Republicans echoed President Donald.

PHOENIX – Arizona Republicans say Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian interference in the 2016 election was a “witch hunt” that exonerates President Donald Trump, but one legal expert who has written a book about prosecuting presidents cautioned that it’s premature for the president to declare victory. All sides agreed, however, that the full.

PHOENIX – Arizona’s growth continues to surge, with a 2019 census report estimating it was the fourth fastest growing state last year. The report, which estimates Maricopa County had reached more than 4 million people by 2016, said population growth in five Western states has surpassed other regions for seven decades. The growth of the.

GLENDALE – Sen. Martha McSally announced this week that the Department of Defense has agreed to establish a task force to combat sexual assault in the military. Thursday at Luke Air Force Base, she introduced some of the task force’s goals, including improving responses to sexual assault, especially the way they’re investigated and prosecuted. The.

WASHINGTON – It’s no secret that President Donald Trump is not a fan of the late Sen. John McCain, but instead of weakening the McCain fan club the president’s latest string of attacks may be having the opposite effect. Republican senators have come forward to defend their former colleague, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has.

PHOENIX – A bill that would move up the date of the Arizona primary election passed through the House Elections Committee on a party line vote Tuesday afternoon. Senate Bill 1154 would change the date of the primary elections from the 10th Tuesday before a general election to the first Tuesday in August. The bill.

SAFFORD – When Mayor Jason Kouts came home from work Jan. 23, 2018, his life was forever changed. But that change has awakened the entire town to the reality of addiction. Kouts’ wife of nearly three decades, Maria, was in the kitchen that afternoon. Their son, Josiah, 25, had missed work and been upstairs in.

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon has identified $150 million for military construction projects in Arizona that could be tapped to fund a border wall, with a $30 million project at Fort Huachuca the likeliest target in the state. The Arizona projects were part of $12.9 billion in projects nationwide from which the Defense Department said it.

WASHINGTON – Phoenix mom Claudia Faudoa joined dozens of activists Monday who called the Environmental Protection Agency’s plan to relax standards on power plant emissions, like mercury, an “attack on American children.” “I’ve traveled all the way from Arizona this morning to tell you that my children are the most precious resource I have,” Faudoa.

TEMPE – United, they mourned, coming together in Arizona in a vigil to show that love triumphs over hate. Muslims. Jews. Christians. Lawmakers and civil rights activists. Hours after 50 people were gunned down and dozens were injured in a terrorist attack at mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, last week, Arizonans spoke of overcoming hate.

WASHINGTON – Backed by sheriffs and members of “angel families,” including three from Arizona, President Donald Trump on Friday vetoed a bill that would have blocked his declaration of a national emergency at the southern border. “I knew this day would come, you know, that he would do something that proves to all of us.

WASHINGTON – A House committee voted Wednesday to rescind the law that lets the secretary of Homeland Security waive regulations that get in the way of a border wall, a move critics say is used increasingly by the Trump administration. The 17-12 vote by the House Homeland Security Committee split along party lines, with Democrats.