George Kelly, 75, charged with second-degree murder over death of Mexican Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, 48, on his property last year
An Arizona judge declared a mistrial on Monday in the case of a rancher accused of fatally shooting a Mexican man on his property near the US-Mexico border.
George Kelly, 75, was charged with second-degree murder in the 30 January 2023 shooting of Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, 48, who lived just south of the border in Nogales.
Continue reading...After decrying state supreme court ruling on ban with no exceptions for rape or incest, lawmakers ensure its potential to take effect
After days of nationwide debate over the Arizona supreme court’s recent decision to uphold a near-total abortion ban from the 19th century, Arizona’s Republican-controlled statehouse has again quashed an effort to repeal the ban.
Republicans, who hold a one-seat majority in both the Arizona house and senate, on Wednesday shot down a procedural measure in the statehouse that would have enabled the chamber to vote on a bill to repeal the ban. Just one Republican, the representative Matt Gress, voted with the house’s 29 Democrats, but the 30-30 split was not enough to move forward.
Continue reading...Kari Lake of Arizona warned supporters of ‘intense’ election year in which Democrats will come after them ‘with everything’
Republican US Senate candidate Kari Lake has told supporters to “strap on a Glock” ahead of the 2024 elections as she struggles to gain ground against her Democratic rival in Arizona.
In a campaign speech made to a crowd in Arizona’s Mohave county on Sunday, Lake echoed Trump-like terms in calling Washington DC a “swamp” – and used a reference to carrying guns when she told people to prepare for an “intense” election year.
Continue reading...Focus on reproductive rights has yielded big wins and Democrats hope threat of more Republican bans will mobilize voters
Kamala Harris’s Friday visit to Arizona was planned before the state’s top court upheld a 160-year-old law that bans almost all abortions. But the news galvanized the vice-president’s message, one that has already yielded stunning victories for liberals since Roe v Wade fell nearly two years ago.
That message is simple: abortion bans happen when Republicans are in charge.
Continue reading...‘They’ve turned the clock to the 1800s’, said the US vice-president as she excoriated ex-president as ‘architect of healthcare crisis’
Kamala Harris pinned the blame for Arizona’s abortion ban squarely on Donald Trump, who she described as the “architect of this healthcare crisis” in a speech at a campaign event in Tucson on Friday.
The state was left reeling after the Arizona supreme court ruled earlier this week that a civil war-era law banning abortion in the state with almost no exceptions is now enforceable.
Continue reading...This live blog is now closed
A vote to amend Fisa’s section 702 to prohibit warrantless surveillance in the House has failed.
The amendment, introduced by Arizona Republican representative Andy Biggs, failed after the yays and nays votes tied at 212-212.
Continue reading...Democrats stymied after state supreme court rules that 1864 law with no exceptions for rape or incest can go into effect
Arizona’s state Republican leadership halted an effort by Democrats on Wednesday to repeal an 1864 law banning almost all abortions, which the state supreme court this week ruled could go into effect.
The move came after Republican lawmakers in the state had denounced the court’s decision, including some who previously expressed support for the law. Donald Trump and other high-profile Republicans, such as the Senate candidate Kari Lake, had also declared their opposition to the ruling with Lake urging lawmakers to “come up with an immediate commonsense solution that Arizonans can support”.
Continue reading...Former president says Arizona abortion ban went too far as Democrats note he appointed justices who ended Roe
The Arizona supreme court decision upended Donald Trump’s gambit on abortion, a day after the former president sought to neutralize the political issue by declining to support a national abortion ban.
Trump had hoped that his announcement on Monday would keep abortion rights mostly out of the conversation ahead of the November elections, but Tuesday’s ruling showed just how difficult it will be to do that, the Washington Post’s Dan Balz writes.
All abortion politics are national, not local. Abortion developments – new laws, new restrictions, new stories of women caught up in heart-wrenching and sometimes life-threatening decisions – are no longer confined to the geography where they take place. They are instantly part of the larger debate.
There is no safe harbor for Trump and the Republicans at this point. The abortion issue is no less complex and no less difficult for many Americans than it was while Roe was in force. But politically the winds have shifted, and done so dramatically.
Continue reading...World’s most valuable chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor to set up third facility in Arizona using funding from Biden policy
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company is to build its most advanced chips in Arizona after receiving a pledge of as much as $11.6bn in US government subsidy as part of Joe Biden’s efforts to attract computer chip production.
TSMC, the world’s most valuable chipmaker, says it aims to start producing the two-nanometre chips at a new factory in Phoenix, Arizona, by 2028.
Continue reading...Republican sued by Stephen Richer, top Maricopa county official, last year after she lost her gubernatorial bid and lied about him
Kari Lake signaled on Tuesday that she will not contest claims that she lied about a top Arizona election official and defamed him, a significant legal concession from the Arizona Republican who has become one of the country’s most prominent election deniers.
Stephen Richer, the top election official in Maricopa county, sued Lake, her campaign and an aligned Pac last year after she lost her gubernatorial bid and repeatedly lied about him. Lake, who is now running for the US Senate, falsely accused him of injecting 300,000 illegal votes into machines and intentionally misprinting ballots so they would be rejected by ballot tabulators.
Continue reading...Companies accused of facilitating gun trafficking and and of being responsible for bloodshed that their guns contribute to in Mexico
A trial court in Arizona has ruled that the Mexican government may proceed in its trailblazing lawsuit against five US gun dealers, who stand accused of facilitating gun trafficking across the border into Mexico.
Mexico argues that the companies’ marketing campaigns and distribution practices mean that they are legally responsible for the bloodshed that their guns contribute to.
Continue reading...John Keller says workers facing onslaught for ‘dutifully and reliably doing their jobs’ as man given 30 months for threats
Election officials across the US are facing an onslaught of unfounded hostility for “dutifully and reliably doing their jobs”, the head of a federal taskforce set up to protect the election community from violent threats said on Monday.
John Keller, who leads the day-to-day efforts of the election threats taskforce, based in Washington, told reporters that the wave of violent threats – unleashed by Donald Trump’s lie that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen – amounted to an attack “on the very foundation of our democracy – our elections”.
Continue reading...Eva Burch, a Democrat, gave 10-minute speech on floor of state senate on Monday about state’s ‘coercive’ maze of restrictions
When Eva Burch learned that her pregnancy was not progressing and decided to have an abortion, Burch and her husband quickly made another decision: Burch, who is a Democratic state senator in Arizona, was going to speak up about it – from the floor of the state senate.
On Monday, as her voice shook and a group of women surrounded her, Burch gave a 10-minute-long speech about her decision and the struggle to navigate Arizona’s “coercive” maze of abortion restrictions. With her speech, Burch joined the ranks of women who have spoken out since the fall of Roe v Wade about their battles to get abortions even for nonviable pregnancies.
Continue reading...The president headed to Nevada, Arizona and Texas to appeal to voters, saying that Donald Trump ‘despises Latinos’
Joe Biden is on a three-day western US election campaign swing through Nevada, Arizona and Texas with a focus on personally appealing to Latino voters, saying they are the reason he defeated Donald Trump in 2020 and urging them to help him do it again in November.
“I need you back,” he told several dozen supporters packed into a local Mexican restaurant in Phoenix, Arizona. And in an interview with the Spanish-language broadcaster Univision he blasted Trump as someone whose hardline policies and biased rhetoric are hostile to Hispanic voters.
Continue reading...Additional federal funding for shelter has been caught in broader political battles about illegal migration and government spending
An Arizona migrant shelter that has housed thousands of asylum seekers plans to halt most operations in two weeks when funding from Washington runs out, a problem for towns along the border where officials fear a surge in homelessness and extra costs.
Arizona’s Pima county, which borders Mexico, has said that at the end of the month its contracts must stop with Tucson’s Casa Alitas shelter and services that transport migrants north from the border cities of Nogales, Douglas and Lukeville.
Continue reading...Number of heat-related deaths in Phoenix, Arizona was more than 50% higher than 2022, which officials say ‘can be prevented’
Public health officials in Arizona’s most populous county on Wednesday reported they confirmed a staggering 645 heat-associated deaths last year – more than 50% higher than 2022 and another consecutive annual record in arid metro Phoenix.
The numbers in the preliminary report by the Maricopa county department of public health alarmed officials in America’s hottest big metro, raising concerns about how to better protect vulnerable groups such as homeless people and older adults from the blistering summer heat.
Continue reading...Sinema won in 2018 as a Democrat and was first non-Republican to win a Senate seat for Arizona since 1994
Kyrsten Sinema, the former Democrat from Arizona who is an independent in the US Senate, said on Tuesday she would not run for re-election this year.
“I love Arizona and I am so proud of what we’ve delivered,” Sinema said in a video posted to social media. “Because I choose civility, understanding, listening, working together to get stuff done, I will leave the Senate at the end of this year.”
Continue reading...State senator Anthony Kern, who was a fake pro-Trump elector in 2020, says legislature should choose electors
A proposal from an Arizona lawmaker calls for the state legislature to decide on presidential electors instead of adhering to a popular vote.
The state senator Anthony Kern, a Republican, served as a fake elector in 2020, falsely asserting that Donald Trump won the state. Those involved in the fake electors schemes in several states have been charged. In Arizona, the fake electors are under investigation by the Democratic attorney general, her office has confirmed. Kern also attended the 6 January 2021 rally at the US Capitol.
Continue reading...Tale of generosity between Tony and Tracey Gonzalez from Illinois and Joely Sanders and Frank Pompa from Arizona goes viral
When Tony Gonzalez of Illinois required an organ donor to be freed from the dialysis machine keeping him alive despite his failing kidney, an Arizona woman named Joely Sanders stepped up.
Sanders’s brother, Frank Pompa, also required a new kidney after one of his had failed – and, of all people, it was Gonzalez’s wife, Tracey, who provided the crucial organ donation to free him from his dialysis machine in October.
Continue reading...A female Mexican gray wolf that was part of reintroduction efforts for the endangered species has been recaptured by officials
A match made in the wilds of New Mexico?
An endangered Mexican wolf captured last weekend after wandering hundreds of miles from Arizona to New Mexico is now being readied for a dating game of sorts as part of federal reintroduction efforts.
Continue reading...