A group of Scottsdale residents fighting a massive development project by law enforcement technology company Axon filed an appeal Monday in their bid to overturn a state law that now bars voters from weighing in on the project, arguing that it is unconstitutional. The group behind the appeal, Taxpayers Against Awful Apartment Zoning Exemptions, claims […]
A federal effort to identify noncitizen voters using voter registration information might be violating state privacy laws, according to Attorney General Kris Mayes. In a letter sent earlier this week to Timothy Courchaine, the U.S. Attorney for Arizona, Mayes and Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes requested confirmation that the personal information of Arizona voters […]
During my time in the Air Force, fighter pilots were the golden boys. In combat, they were the tip of the spear. But they never fought alone. They depended on aircraft maintenance crews, airfield managers, security forces, civil engineers, personnel specialists and countless other support personnel. Everyone had a role. Everyone mattered. Whether the pilots […]
Attorney General Kris Mayes wants an appeals court to dissolve a trial court judge’s order that blocked her from prosecuting online prediction market company Kalshi for violating Arizona’s gambling laws. Her request comes after appellate judges in a different case ruled last month that gambling on sporting events is not protected by the federal law […]
Law enforcement agencies outside of Arizona are some of the biggest users of Flock data gathered by the Maricopa County Sheriff Office and Lake Havasu Police Department, records obtained by the Arizona Mirror show. Both agencies say they’re limiting that data sharing, but privacy advocates are still concerned. The records detailing Flock usage by the […]
The attorney for two Green Party candidates accused of fraudulently obtaining public campaign funding and lawyers for the commission that regulates that funding sparred in Maricopa County Superior Court Thursday over whether the commission has the power to make candidates repay ill-gotten funding. Tim La Sota, the attorney for Risa Lombardo and Duwayne Collier, the […]
An Army drone like those frequently flown in overseas warzones has been flying along Arizona’s southern border, doing loops around border towns, as part of a collaboration between the military and U.S. Department of Homeland Security that has privacy advocates concerned. Under Operation Ardent Vanguard, the military operation overseen by the U.S. Northern Command to […]
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes and Senate President Warren Petersen spent an hour talking over each other and making snide comments in a Wednesday night debate over which of the two candidates should be the state’s top law enforcement official for the next four years. Mayes highlighted the lawsuits her office has been involved in […]
The Republican and Democratic nominees for Arizona Treasurer attempted to woo voters Wednesday evening during a debate in which both men tried to paint the other as untrustworthy of being responsible for overseeing how the state’s money is invested. Republican Elijah Norton and Democrat Nick Mansour each claimed that they intend to keep “partisan politics” […]
The Arizona Citizens Clean Election Commission says that its investigation into whether two Green Party candidates fraudulently qualified for campaign funding is squarely within the scope of its legally mandated job of protecting the state’s public campaign finance system, and that a Maricopa County Superior Court judge should throw out the candidates’ lawsuit to block […]
Family members of homicide victims called on lawmakers and law enforcement to shift funding away from heavy sentences and capital punishment to cold-case investigations, violence prevention and survivor support. At a news conference Monday, members of Arizonans for Effective Public Safety recounted the still unsolved murders of their daughter, son, husband and cousin, crimes that […]
Republican state Sen. Jake Hoffman set out to expose Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs’ alleged pay-to-play mess and instead stepped into a money-making scheme of his own. Hoffman is now backpedaling subpoenas he issued last week against Hobbs, Attorney General Kris Mayes and others to appear before his legislative committee. He’s blaming the “crooked media” for […]
Voters will decide in November whether city governments must earn their approval before raising grocery taxes. And while Republicans say doing so will help ease the financial burden on everyday Arizonans, some city officials warn that it will make it harder to provide public services. Proposition 316 would cap grocery tax rates at 2% and […]
Destroying a public record after a member of the public requests it should land government agencies in legal trouble, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled today. Matthew Abraham, a former English professor at the University of Arizona, sued the Arizona Board of Regents after the university denied access to a list of records pertaining to hiring […]
Andy Biggs, the Republican nominee for Arizona governor, said last year that he would support putting cameras in public school classrooms so that parents can keep an eye on “woke” teachers. Experts say that doing so would put student safety and privacy at risk because, even if streaming camera feeds are meant for a private […]
Attorneys for Arizona’s prison system ran to the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday to make one last plea to delay a court-ordered takeover of its healthcare system. A federal district court judge and the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals already denied the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry’s request to put off receivership […]
An immigrant rights group will spend millions and knock on tens of thousands of doors to fire up Latino voters ahead of the November midterms, in the hopes of electing progressive candidates who will push back against President Donald Trump. Living United for Change in Arizona, which frequently campaigns on behalf of Democrats, is planning […]
September is National Cold Case Month and on Sept. 20, my cousin Loretta Lynn would have turned 65 years old. Instead, my family has spent nearly four decades waiting for the identity of who killed her. On June 14, 1988, I was traveling in Europe when I picked up a pay phone and received the […]
A national political action committee that aims to get science-minded Democrats elected is investing nearly $1 million in ads opposing former NFL kicker Jay Feely in his bid for Congress in one of Arizona’s most competitive contests. The PAC, 314 Action Fund, will be running its ad across the district for the next week on […]
Arizona’s billion-dollar and growing school voucher program took center stage Tuesday night as state Treasurer Kimberly Yee and former schoolteacher and community college president Teresa Leyba Ruiz sparred over how they would lead Arizona’s public schools as the next state schools chief. The program, known formally as Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, is projected to cost the […]
When Andy Biggs, the Republican nominee for governor, was a state senator, he tried to abolish Medicaid in the Grand Canyon State because it cost taxpayers too much to provide health insurance for low-income Arizonans. “When we allow the generations in the future to be robbed and enslaved to pay for the healthcare costs of […]
A political action committee founded by the head of one of Arizona’s largest charter school networks is facing a criminal investigation for allegedly violating campaign finance law by using funds from his company to donate directly to Republican candidates. Glenn Way is the CEO of Charter One LLC and the chairman of the Educational Freedom […]
Two candidates facing civil and criminal investigations into whether they fraudulently qualified for millions in public campaign funding want a court to block the Clean Elections Commission from making them repay the money. Gubernatorial candidate Risa Lombardo and secretary of state candidate Duwayne Collier filed a lawsuit against the Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission, its […]
Criminally, Gov. Katie Hobbs may be cleared. But politically and ethically, this whole thing with Sunshine Residential still stinks royally. And, no, it’s not because the person who won’t charge her criminally is fellow Democrat Kris Mayes, the state’s attorney general. It has a lot to do with Hobbs’ secrecy about a state contractor and […]
Cooling systems in Arizona state prisons failed this summer as temperatures hit triple digits. Now, the reported outages have caught the attention of a state legislator who is demanding that leaders at the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry answer questions about it. To that end, Rep. Walt Blackman, a Republican from Snowflake, issued […]