Attorney General Kris Mayes and Adrian Fontes on the floor of the Arizona House of Representatives in January 2025. (Photo by Gage Skidmore/Flickr/CC BY-SA 2.0)

‘Suck on a salt lick’: Fontes fires back after Trump election speech, DHS pressure on states

Arizona’s top election official and top prosecutor both had strong words for President Donald Trump and his administration after a prime-time speech on Thursday that was filled with false claims of widespread voter fraud.

Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes bristled at the prospect of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security penalizing states...

President Donald Trump shakes hands with newly sworn in Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin during a ceremony in the Oval Office on March 24, 2026. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

DHS chief threatens to prosecute election officials as Trump escalates fight over state voter rolls

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened on Friday to prosecute election officials in states that don’t “participate in securing the elections” ahead of the November midterms.

Election officials who do not comply with administration directives to enhance security of voting machines and to share voter data with the federal government through the powerful Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements computer program would be subject to fines and even prison time...

(Photo via iStock / Getty Images Plus)

Judge hands Ohio’s former prisons chief sweeping control over Arizona prison healthcare

A federal judge on Friday appointed Ohio’s former prisons chief to run Arizona’s prison healthcare system, giving her the sole power to determine what the state needs to do to stop violating the constitutional rights of inmates with substandard medical care — and she set the stage for nullifying two state laws that experts have said make it impossible to do that...

(Photo via Getty Images)

Federal judge blocks Arizona prison agency’s push to hire less-qualified doctors for inmate care

A federal judge rejected a request from the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry that it be allowed to hire doctors who don’t meet agreed upon standards, sharply criticizing the state prison agency for failing to increase salaries, as it has been repeatedly advised to do.

It’s the latest loss for the state in a lawsuit that began in 2012 alleging that the healthcare provided to inmates in Arizona prisons is so poor that it is unconstitutional...

Protesters opposing legislation that would require local police departments to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement carry signs in front of the Arizona Senate building on Feb. 17, 2025. (Photo by Jerod MacDonald-Evoy/Arizona Mirror)

GOP legislative leaders, Mayes to defend Arizona deportation law in court

Republican legislative leaders and Attorney General Kris Mayes are on the same side in a lawsuit challenging the state’s power to enforce immigration law, playing defense for a 2024 law that would give state judges the authority to issue deportation orders and local police officers the power to arrest migrants.

Last week, the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, which offers pro bono legal defense for many, including...

(Photo by Getty Images)

High court says public comment on Arizona elections manual is not required

The Arizona Secretary of State is not required to allow public comment on new versions of the state’s elections rulebook, the state’s highest court wrote in a Friday opinion that explained an order the court issued nine months prior.

In the October order, the Arizona Supreme Court said that the state’s Election Procedures Manual, which tells local elections officials how to implement state law, doesn’t have to follow the standard...

People gather near the scene of 26th Street and Nicollet Avenue in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti on Jan. 24, 2026, the third shooting in as many weeks. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

ICE agents have shot 22 people during Trump’s second term. Most were during traffic stops.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on July 13 killed 25-year-old Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a Colombian national with legal work authorization, in Maine, making him the 22nd person shot at by federal immigration officers during President Donald Trump’s second term.

Nearly all of those 22 incidents...

ICYMI

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