• Slug: News–Groundwater Protection. 560 words.
• 3 photos available

By Allison Kotzbauer
Cronkite News

PHOENIX – Gov. Katie Hobbs along with a group of bipartisan state and rural leaders announced legislation Thursday that gives rural communities a say in managing local groundwater.

The Rural Groundwater Management Act of 2025 would allow rural Arizonans to create water management programs that would have decision-making authority over conservation programs. Those programs are meant to reduce groundwater use and improve aquifer conditions, according to a fact sheet provided by the Governor’s Office.

Senate Bill 1425 also would create five-person councils in each water management program. Council members would be selected by the Arizona Senate president, House speaker and minority leaders in both chambers.

Continue reading “Bill would give Arizona rural communities a say in how groundwater is allocated”

• Slug: News–Holocaust Center. 710 words.
• Photo available

By Katrina Michalak
Cronkite News

PHOENIX – Funds for the future Hilton Family Holocaust Education Center in Phoenix are now up to $38 million, providing more resources ahead of the expected opening in April 2027.

The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors allocated $2 million to the project in October 2024. Phoenix has given $2 million, and the state also authorized a $7 million appropriation in the fall.

“This collaboration with the Arizona Jewish Historical Society will help preserve and embrace the rich heritage of our local Jewish communities, educate the public on the historical significance of the Holocaust, and teach students to take responsibility for building a better and more just world,” said Board of Supervisors Chairman Thomas Galvin in an October news release. The $2 million from Maricopa County came from Galvin’s portion of the county’s Community Solutions Funding. Continue reading “Phoenix Holocaust center raises $38 million, expected to open in 2027 to foster education”

• Slug: News–RFK Vaccines Fluoride. 1,000 words.
• Photo available

By Madeline Bates
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – Kindergartners are less likely to get vaccinations in Arizona than in almost any other state. And fewer than three in five state residents have access to fluoridated water – also well below the national average.

These metrics leave public health experts in Arizona especially concerned about Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was grilled by senators Wednesday during the first day of his confirmation hearings for secretary of Health and Human Services.

For years, RFK Jr. has questioned the safety and effectiveness of childhood immunizations against measles, polio and other scourges that have mostly disappeared in the United States. And he wants to eliminate fluoridation of public water supplies, which dental experts believe would cause an epidemic of unnecessary cavities.

“It would be catastrophic if he gets in this job,” said Will Humble, executive director of the Arizona Public Health Association, whose members include nurses, researchers and other health care professionals.

Continue reading “Arizona lags in childhood vaccinations and fluoride – public health measures targeted by Trump HHS nominee RFK Jr.”

• Slug: News–Birthright Citizenship Blocked. 420 words.
• 3 photos available.

By Emma Paterson
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – At the behest of Arizona and three other states, a federal judge in Seattle on Thursday temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship for anyone born on U.S. soil without at least one parent who’s an American citizen or green card holder.

Senior U.S. District Court Judge John Coughenour was the first judge to hear and decide on Trump’s controversial executive order reinterpreting the 14th Amendment, which grants citizenship to anyone born in the U.S. Nearly half the states have challenged the order that Trump signed on his first day back in office.

Coughenour said that in his 40 years as a judge, he has “never seen something so blatantly unconstitutional.” Continue reading “Federal judge blocks Trump’s birthright citizenship order”

• Slug: News–Pardons J6 Arizona. 1,282 words.
• 3 photos available.

By Matthew DeWees
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – The “QAnon Shaman” called President Donald Trump’s pardons for him and other Jan. 6 rioters “a brilliant political move.” Another Arizona man in the mob called his pardon a relief but criticized Trump for wiping away convictions for others who attacked police.

“It’s a really nice weight off my shoulders,” said Cory Konold, a Tucson man who was near the front of the crowd that day with his sister. But, he added, “I don’t think truly violent offenders should be fully pardoned.”

Roughly 15 of the 1,583 defendants who received clemency from Trump are from Arizona. Continue reading “‘QAnon Shaman’ and other Jan. 6 rioters from Arizona celebrate Trump pardons that many denounce as a slap to democracy and police”

• Slug: Birthright Citizenship. 815 words.
• Photo, caption available below.

By Emma Paterson
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – Arizona and 21 other states went to court Tuesday hoping to block President Donald Trump’s efforts to end birthright citizenship for children born to non-Americans.

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes called Trump’s order “blatantly unconstitutional.” Gov. Katie Hobbs, a fellow Democrat, blasted it as both “unconstitutional and un-American.”

Continue reading “Arizona joins 21 other states to oppose Trump’s ban on birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants”

• Slug: NAGPRA Hobbs. 700 words.
• Photos, captions available below.

By Mackenzie Miller, Matthew Bird and Justin Patton
Cronkite News and the Howard Center for Investigative Journalism at ASU

PHOENIX – The mood at the Arizona State Museum at the University of Arizona in Tucson on Wednesday was shock.

The museum’s staff, who facilitate the repatriation of Native American human remains and artifacts to Indigenous tribes, learned that Gov. Katie Hobbs was seeking $7 million to aid their efforts.

Continue reading “‘Take repatriation seriously’: Hobbs pledges $7M to speed state museum’s work to return ancestors, artifacts to Arizona tribes”

• Slug: Trump Unscripted. 600 words.
• Photos, captions below.

By Matthew DeWees
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – After a scripted half-hour inaugural address, President Donald Trump went off on a lengthy, unscripted riff to an overflow crowd at the Capitol – venting about a “rigged” 2020 election and blasting former President Joe Biden for 11th-hour pardons of lawmakers who investigated the Jan. 6 attack.

Continue reading “Trump vents about Biden’s pardons, Capitol riot ‘hostages,’ crowd undercount 8 years ago in unscripted post-inauguration speech”

• Slug: Trump Inauguration. 770 words.
• Photos, captions below.

By Madeline Bates
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump returned to office with an ambitious agenda intended to reassert American leadership and undo four years of Democrat Joe Biden’s policies.

Continue reading “Donald Trump’s inaugural pledges: Retake Panama Canal, seal border, rename Gulf of Mexico, restore U.S. ‘golden age’”

• Slug: Trump Rally. 1,800 words.
• Photos, captions below.

By Madeline Bates, Matthew DeWees, Emma Paterson and Samuel Travis
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – Donald Trump offered a vision of American renewal as he returns to the White House, along with swift and sweeping changes on immigration, “woke” ideology and the economy.

Continue reading “Donald Trump vows breathtaking pace of pardons, deportations and retribution after inauguration”

• Slug: News-Inauguration Arizona Democrats. 470 words.
• File photo available.

By Emma Paterson
Cronkite News

WASHINGTON – Newly elected Rep. Yassamin Ansari prefers to be in Phoenix as President-elect Donald Trump is sworn in. But freshman Sen. Ruben Gallego and veteran Rep. Greg Stanton will be among the Democrats on hand to witness his return to power.

The second inauguration of the divisive former president is putting civility to the test. Former first lady Michelle Obama is skipping it. So is former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

“I have a tradition of going to the MLK events in Phoenix,” Ansari said in a brief interview outside the House chamber. “I will be attending a march.” Continue reading “Trump inauguration gets cold shoulder from some Arizona Democrats but draws both Ruben Gallego and Kari Lake”