by Staff Reporter | Nov 16, 2025 | Must Read, News
By Staff Reporter |
Democratic Sen. Ruben Gallego has refused to delete an unverified theory about the relationship between child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein and President Donald Trump.
Gallego claimed Trump and Epstein spent Thanksgiving together in 2017, citing an email exchange from Epstein. The Democratic Party deleted their post propagating this claim, which Gallego quoted in a post on X.
“The ‘Trump was secretly helping the cops take down Epstein’ theory kinda falls apart when you know he may have spent Thanksgiving with him. As President. After Epstein was already convicted,” said Gallego.
Over a decade before 2017 Thanksgiving, however, Trump had banned Epstein from Mar-a-Lago. Multiple sources have reported this timeline in years past to reporters and in a book published in 2020.
In 2008, Epstein was convicted of two state felony charges in Florida: soliciting prostitution, and soliciting prostitution with a minor. Epstein entered a plea deal of a 13-month jail sentence with work release and requirement to register as a sex offender.
Trump has repeatedly claimed to have had no knowledge of Epstein’s crimes until the federal charges emerged in 2019. The president also claimed at the time that he hadn’t spoken to Epstein in about 15 years.
It wasn’t until late 2018, a year after the Thanksgiving in question occurred, that investigative reporting from the Miami Herald publicized details of the 2008 plea deal. That following summer, federal prosecutors hit Epstein with the child sex trafficking charges that would ultimately conclude with his apparent suicide in prison a month later.
Unlike Gallego, the Democratic Party deleted their post on X in which they claimed Trump spent Thanksgiving with Epstein in 2017. Included in the post was a picture of an email exchange between Epstein and the founder of a major modeling agency, Faith Kates.
“Documents show Donald Trump spent Thanksgiving with Jeffrey Epstein in 2017,” said the Democrats in their deleted X post. “At the time, Trump was already president, and Epstein was already a convicted sex offender.”
Trump spent Thanksgiving at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach with family in 2017. A book published in 2020, “The Grifter’s Club: Trump, Mar-a-Lago, and the Selling of the Presidency,” included accounts from several Mar-a-Lago club members that Trump banned Epstein from the club years before the holiday, sometime before the 2008 pleading.
The Thanksgiving 2017 email was part of the 20,000-document dump from House Republicans on Wednesday, just hours before the House passed an agreement to end the government shutdown with six Democratic votes.
In another email from January 2019, approximately six months before federal prosecutors closed in and about two months after the investigative report dropped, Epstein claimed in an email to Michael Wolff, an author-journalist and longtime confidant of his, that Trump had knowledge of Epstein’s sex trafficking.
“Trump said he asked me to resign, never a member [at Mar-a-Lago] ever,” said Epstein. “Of course [Trump] knew about the girls as he asked Ghislaine to stop.”
Ghislaine Maxwell was the British socialite convicted of child sex trafficking for Epstein in 2021.
Maxwell trafficked one of her victims, Virginia Giuffre, from her job as a teenage Mar-a-Lago spa attendant. Giuffre was 16 when she was trafficked.
Throughout her book “Nobody’s Girl,” public statements, and sworn testimonies, Giuffre has offered consistent, repeated defenses of Trump’s innocence and non-involvement with Epstein’s trafficking.
Giuffre’s statements also challenge the reliability of Epstein’s perspective and claims about Trump in his emails. In another email released within the 20,000 documents this week, Epstein claimed Trump and Giuffre “spent hours” together at his home. However, Giuffre said in her book that she only met Trump several times briefly in public places, such as Mar-a-Lago before she was trafficked and at a Halloween party.
Giuffre is unable to offer further clarity on these developments in the Epstein files, as she committed suicide in April. Her book was published posthumously in October.
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by Staff Reporter | Nov 15, 2025 | News
By Staff Reporter |
South Tucson Mayor Roxanna “Roxy” Valenzuela is in a relationship with former New York Mayor Bill de Blasio.
De Blasio is still legally married. He and his wife, Chirlane McCray, separated in 2023 but did not divorce.
At the time that Valenzuela and de Blasio began seeing one another, the former mayor was still in another relationship with Nomiki Konst: a New York progressive activist and former Arizona candidate who formerly was a reporter with “The Young Turks” podcast, as the New York Post reported.
Although Konst hails from New York currently, she is originally from Tucson like Valenzuela. Konst ran for Congress in Arizona briefly in 2012, the same year she co-chaired former President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign.
De Blasio said he hoped Konst would still be his friend after learning of this affair.
“Nomiki and I had a lovely relationship for 10 months, I have deep respect for her and what she stands for, and I hope we can have a real friendship in the future,” said de Blasio.
Since unofficially splitting with his wife, de Blasio has enjoyed a string of affairs widely reported in the press.
In December 2023, de Blasio had an affair with a then-married woman, Kristy Stark, who at the time founded and led an early childhood behavioral company supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This month, Stark joined the University of Michigan faculty as a behavioral science professor.
Although Stark claimed to be going through a divorce at the time of her tryst with de Blasio, her then-husband denied knowledge of any divorce taking place and any infidelity by his then-wife.
Court records show divorce proceedings initiated in Michigan in January 2024, almost a month to the day after reports emerged of Stark and de Blasio’s affair.
De Blasio is also affiliated with the University of Michigan within the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy as a residence policymaker.
Already reports have emerged that de Blasio’s latest relationship with Valenzuela has taken a turn for the worse, per anonymous sources, who say the mayor wants to progress the relationship.
Valenzuela and de Blasio met during a June fundraising dinner in Arizona. The two were introduced by de Blasio’s then-girlfriend, Konst, per reports.
In recent weeks, Valenzuela was reported as residing in a motel purchased in 2023 for affordable housing by the organization where she works, Casa Maria Catholic Worker Community.
Although Valenzuela does have two children, she is not married. The father of one of her children, Billy Peard, told The Post that he and Valenzuela share parenting responsibilities. Per social media posts, the two were partners for around one of the two years of their daughter’s life.
Peard, a Tucson attorney, previously ran for the Arizona State House in 2020 as a Democratic candidate. Prior to that, Peard was a staff attorney for the ACLU, Community Legal Aid, and Georgia Legal Services.
Like Valenzuela, de Blasio has two children.
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by Staff Reporter | Nov 14, 2025 | News
By Staff Reporter |
Rep. Adelita Grijalva opted not to address accusations that Democrats blocked an immediate, full release of the Epstein files on Wednesday.
A reporter questioned Grijalva during the Congressional Hispanic Caucus press conference about the Democratic inaction on a resolution to release the files in full that day.
Grijalva opted not to answer and instead stepped back to allow Rep. Pete Aguilar to speak on her behalf. Aguilar insisted Republicans were trying to prevent the release of the files.
“I think it’s incredibly clear that Republicans will stop at nothing to avoid the disclosure of this information,” said Aguilar.
Upon Grijalva’s swearing in on Wednesday, hers was the final signature needed on a petition to force a House vote on their full release. However, House Democrats rejected an attempt at a full release that same day.
Rep. Tim Burchett, a Republican, moved for unanimous consent of a resolution (HR 4405) to release all of the Epstein files immediately. House Democrats objected.
“We Republicans are requesting this unanimous consent. Are Democrats objecting to this request?” asked Burchett.
“Chair reminds the gentleman from Tennessee that as indicated by Section 956 the House Rules and Manual: it is not a proper parliamentary inquiry to ask the chair to indicate which side of the aisle has failed under the speaker’s guidelines to clear a unanimous consent request,” responded the speaker pro tempore.
Burchett said this was a strategic move to control the narrative on the Epstein files: by not authorizing a release all at once, a narrative could be better crafted.
“This is all gamesmanship folks. It’s not about releasing the files. They had something on Trump, they would’ve released it five and half or four years [ago]. And they hate Trump more than anything in the world,” said Burchett. “So they can piecemeal the truth and the half-truths, both sides, of what really went down with Epstein.”
Grijalva declined to address this inaction by her colleagues; however, she had much to say about House Speaker Mike Johnson.
The freshman congresswoman claimed Johnson’s delay in swearing her in had little to do with the government shutdown and everything to do with him being “misogynistic” and her being “a woman of color.” Grijalva framed the government delay as a great effort to prevent her swearing in.
“If I were a Republican, I would not have waited this long. If I were a man, I would not have waited this long. We all know that the rules are always different for women of color and people of color and we have to fight against that,” said Grijalva. “People in our community know what it’s like to depend on a Grijalva.”
Grijalva pledged to advance legislation to ensure the swearing-in delay that she encountered wouldn’t occur in the future.
A vote on the full release of the Epstein files is anticipated to occur sometime next week.
On Wednesday, House Republican leadership did release an additional trove of the Epstein files. The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released an additional 20,000 pages of documents.
As part of their publicization of the documents, Democrats redacted some of the material in the newly released trove.
Members of the media and public questioned the Democrats’ redactions, which included the hiding of a victim’s name in connection to an allegation against President Donald Trump.
The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform responded to the sensationalized redaction that the mystery victim in question was Virginia Giuffre: a known advocate of Trump’s innocence in relation to Epstein.
“[T]his victim, Virginia Giuffre, publicly said that she never witnessed wrongdoing by President Trump,” stated the committee. “Democrats are trying to create a fake narrative to slander President Trump.”
Along with progress on the Epstein files, Congress also voted to end the government shutdown on Wednesday.
The shutdown lasted 43 days, the longest-running one in the nation’s history. Six House Democrats joined Republicans to vote for an end to the shutdown, 222 to 209. The Senate voted to end the shutdown on Monday.
President Donald Trump signed the spending bill into law on Wednesday night, officially ending the shutdown.
Arizona’s elected officials were divided along party lines across both chambers in their votes on ending the government shutdown. Democrats voted against it, Republicans voted for it.
The Democratic votes came from Reps. Henry Cuellar (Texas), Donald Davis (North Carolina), Jared Golden (Massachusetts), Adam Gray (California), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Washington), and Thomas Suozzi (New York).
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
by Staff Reporter | Nov 13, 2025 | News
By Staff Reporter |
A recent whistleblower filing alleges Attorney General Kris Mayes was paid to prosecute President Donald Trump’s supporters.
According to the whistleblower, Christina Bobb — one of the indicted former Trump lawyers and current senior elections counsel for the Republican National Committee — Mayes’ inadvertently disclosed in filings her receipt of $200,000 from a Democratic Party offshoot founded in the 2020 election cycle for the purpose of defeating Trump and his allies.
The funds came from States United Democracy Center (SUDC), which the complaint alleged was payment to grant the organization prosecutorial influence over Mayes’ case against Trump’s 2020 attorneys, allies, and electors. The payment came in two allotments: $50,000 and $150,000.
“Prosecutors claim on the record and in emails that States United represents their office,” stated the complaint.
SUDC delivered a document to Mayes in the summer of 2023 proposing the charges to be brought against Trump’s foremost 2020 supporters. Mayes’ chief deputy attorney general, Dan Barr, told Capitol Media Services last December that the SUDC document “did not have a significant, if much, impact at all” in their case against the Trump 2020 electors.
Consistent with Mayes’ ongoing resistance to disclose further details of their working relationship with SUDC as related to the prosecution of Trump supporters, Barr declined to “get into the inner workings” of their relationship with SUDC.
Two key participants within SUDC involvement in Mayes’ prosecution have a history of high-profile actions taken to undermine Trump.
SUDC founder Norm Eisen was co-counsel for the House Judiciary Committee during the first impeachment of Trump in 2020.
The attorney on SUDC filings, Marc Elias, was counsel for former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Elias also coordinated the Steele dossier that would serve as the basis for the falsified allegations of Russia interference in the 2016 election. In recent years, Elias has been the left-leaning legal bully stick ensuring the success of Democrat-led election reforms and demise of Republican-led election reforms.
The whistleblower complaint also questioned whether Mayes would receive a third payment upon a successful conviction.
Bobbs’ complaint was filed alongside a motion to disqualify Mayes and SUDC from continuing prosecution.
The motion came shortly after a Maricopa County Superior Court remanded Mayes’ case back to the grand jury for violating due process.
In September, several months after this motion was filed, Mayes lost her bid to continue prosecution with the court of appeals.
Mayes not only has these recent court outcomes stacked against her case — she has federal pressures as well.
Last Friday, President Donald Trump pardoned his key 2020 supporters through a proclamation — including those whom Mayes seeks to prosecute.
“This proclamation ends a grave national injustice perpetrated upon the American people following the 2020 Presidential Election and continues the process of national reconciliation,” stated Trump.
Pinal County Attorney Brad Miller responded to the pardons with the prediction that Mayes would drop the case, saying she had “no choice” in a Tuesday interview with The Gateway Pundit.
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by Staff Reporter | Nov 12, 2025 | News
By Staff Reporter |
Arizona may be the next state to adopt drug injection sites following Governor Katie Hobbs’ veto.
Safe injection sites, overdose prevention centers, safer drug consumption services, supervised injection services—all descriptors for locations or facilities where drug addicts can inject illegal drugs while medical personnel watch to ensure an overdose doesn’t occur. In the event of an overdose, personnel intervene to reverse it.
Arizona doesn’t have any drug injection sites—yet. It also doesn’t have a ban on them, and it won’t for the foreseeable future under this current administration.
Earlier this year, Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed HB2798, a bill that would have prohibited local governments from allowing the development of any drug injection sites. Hobbs indicated the injection sites were part of “common sense solutions” for drug addiction.
“These sites are nonexistent in Arizona,” said Hobbs. “I encourage the Legislature to seek common sense solutions to actually help Arizonans struggling with substance use disorder.”
Hobbs’ veto rationale wasn’t widely shared by others in her party. Other states banned drug injection sites before they came into existence. Pennsylvania, for example, passed a ban in 2023 with the support of Governor Josh Shapiro, also a Democrat. So did California.
State-supplied overdose reversal kits are widespread in the state already, even and especially in places where minors frequent. Arizona schools have received tens of thousands of overdose kits in recent years to address the growing trend of minors abusing drugs. Libraries across the Valley also received more than their fair share.
The lawmaker behind the rejected bill, Republican State Rep. Matt Gress, said Hobbs should be replaced for killing his legislation.
Gress paired his commentary with recent footage of an injection site from Canada in Vancouver, British Columbia.
“Arizona deserves a better governor,” said Gress.
Those who spoke out against the bill during committee hearings included the Southwest Recovery Alliance (SRA).
SRA’s executive director Arlene Mahoney opposed the bill language referring to drug injection sites as “narcotics injection sites” rather than “overdose prevention centers,” which advocates often prefer.
“I think the name ‘narcotics injection site’ incites a lot of fear into people and it doesn’t encompass what an overdose prevention center actually provides. It’s an integrative healthcare facility that offers, yes, a safe place for people to consume pre-obtained drugs inside a facility which they would be doing in parks and other places anyways,” said Mahoney.
Mahoney was a social worker and co-investigator on a federally funded study on methadone application at the University of Arizona’s Harm Reduction Research Lab from last year to August.
In 2023, the Biden administration issued a $5 million grant to study the effectiveness of overdose prevention across 1,000 participants at two safe injection sites in New York City and one in Providence, Rhode Island, over the course of four years.
The first injection site in the United States was authorized to launch by New York City in 2021.
Apart from New York and Rhode Island, few legally sanctioned drug injection sites exist because of concerns with federal drug laws.
The city council of Denver, Colorado, attempted to implement a drug injection site in 2018, but the Trump administration warned the site would be illegal.
However, after the Biden administration showed a friendliness to the concept, more drug injection centers are emerging.
In 2022, San Francisco launched a social services resource facility, the Tenderloin Center, that quickly devolved into a drug injection site. The transition to the latter caused the site’s closure after less than a year.
The Tenderloin Center racked up a serious bill: $22 million to service around 400 people daily for 11 months. That’s about $72,400 a day—just under $200 per person if, indeed, an average of 400 people used the center daily.
Last year, Vermont established operating guidelines for drug injection centers after its legislature authorized and funded a drug injection center in the city of Burlington. The city launched its drug injection pilot program earlier this year.
Minnesota has authorized state funding for drug injection centers, but hasn’t granted legal authorization for them.
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