A Republican State Senator is speaking out against the Arizona governor’s decision to veto one of his education-related bills.
Last week, Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed SB 1151, which would have allowed state teachers or administrators in all schools to “read or post copies or excerpts of the Ten Commandments.”
Hobbs, in a veto letter to Senate President Warren Petersen, explained that she had “serious concerns about the constitutionality of this legislation,” adding that she also felt it “is also unnecessary.”
The sponsor of the bill, Senator Anthony Kern, expressed his outrage over the governor’s action, writing, “I’m appalled the state’s top elected official is abandoning God and the very foundation our country was built upon by not allowing teachers to expose their students to the morals and ethics outlined in the Ten Commandments. When you look at some of the garbage being forced on our children in the classroom, it’s no wonder rates of depression, anxiety, and suicide among youth are at their highest levels ever recorded. When children are exposed to good, noble, honest, and righteous ideas, they are more prone to being better human beings with sound character, able to navigate life’s problems with grace, and have a greater chance of treating each other with respect and dignity throughout life. Sadly, Katie Hobbs’ veto is a prime example of Democrats’ efforts to push state-sponsored atheism while robbing Arizona’s children of the opportunity to flourish with a healthy moral compass.”
On the Arizona Legislature’s Request to Speak system, the proposal drew a significant amount of opposition, including representatives from the Arizona Association of County School Superintendents, Arizona Education Association, American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona, Save Our Schools Arizona, Arizona School Boards Association, and Americans United for Separation of Church and State.
SB 1151 had first passed the State Senate in February with a 16-12 vote (with two members not voting), before being approved in the State House earlier this month with a 31-28 tally (with one member not voting).
Daniel Stefanski is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
The Arizona House voted on Wednesday to repeal the state’s total abortion ban in a close 32-28 vote. The repeal is now in the Senate’s hands.
Three Republicans joined Democrats to eradicate Arizona’s abortion ban: Tim Dunn, Matt Gress, Justin Wilmeth. The repeal would mean that another existing law restricting abortions after 15 weeks goes into effect.
The historic abortion ban predates Arizona’s statehood and lasted up until the Supreme Court’s codification of abortion in 1973 through Roe v. Wade.
House Speaker Ben Toma, congressional candidate for District 8, said in a press release that the vote was rushed, a grave error that would allow for the slaughter of unborn children for up to 15 weeks.
“It would have been prudent and responsible to allow the courts to decide the constitutionality of the pre-Roe law,” said Toma. “I feel compelled to reiterate my personal view that this decision to repeal the abortion ban in Arizona effectively means that we are allowing the murder of unborn children up to 15 weeks of pregnancy.”
Toma chided Democrats for a lack of decorum on the House floor, citing outbursts and personal attacks. The speaker also warned that the opposing party would continue to push for a wider window for abortions, all the way up to birth — effectively, infanticide.
“Democrats are pushing radicalism and will not relent until Arizona recognizes abortion on demand and abortion through 9 months of pregnancy,” said Toma.
🚨Statement from Arizona House Speaker @RepBenToma on today’s vote on HB 2677:
“I fervently disagree with my Democrat colleagues who advocate for extremism through unlimited, unrestricted, and unregulated abortions. Abortions are not healthcare. Abortion kills life. Abortion… pic.twitter.com/X7QsmWulzK
— Arizona House Republicans (@AZHouseGOP) April 24, 2024
One of the three Republicans to join Democrats to repeal the abortion ban, Dunn, defended his vote in a press release insisting that he is pro-life, but that abortions should still be allowed in cases of rape and incest — situations for which the historic abortion ban didn’t grant exceptions. Dunn said his decision was the “most pro-life vote” possible.
“Should the pre-Roe law remain in effect, I firmly believe more lives will be lost over time. The public backlash would result in codifying disturbing and unlimited abortions in the Arizona Constitution, which is something that I cannot allow to happen,” said Dunn.
I hope you will join me in encouraging a culture of life, one that supports mothers, children, families and always stands for the unborn. pic.twitter.com/C6E6916vl5
Gress also issued a press release claiming he is pro-life. However, Gress didn’t go into details about how the abortion ban went too far. Rather, Gress lumped those supportive of total abortion bans and those supportive of unfettered abortion together as extremists.
“As someone who is both pro-life and the product of strong women in my life, I refuse to buy into the false notion pushed by the extremes on both sides of this issue that we cannot respect and protect women and defend new life at the same time,” said Gress.
Democratic lawmakers celebrated the vote. The author of the bill repealing the historic abortion ban, House Bill 2677, was Democratic Representative Stephanie Stahl Hamilton.
The House narrowly rejected a motion to transmit the bill immediately to Governor Katie Hobbs, 30-30, should the Senate have returned the bill unamended. Gress was the sole Republican who joined his Democratic colleagues in voting for that motion.
Hobbs praised the abortion ban repeal, calling the law “archaic” and a threat to women’s lives. As Toma predicted, Hobbs indicated that the securing of abortions up to 15 weeks was only the beginning.
“I will do everything I can to stop harmful legislation that strips women’s control of their bodies. But there is much more to do,” said Hobbs. “I encourage each Arizonan to continue to speak out and fight for your reproductive freedoms.”
I’m thrilled the House has finally decided to do the right thing and repeal the archaic 1864 near-total abortion ban, which would have jailed doctors & threatened women’s lives.
It’s time for the Senate to follow suit and send the repeal to my desk. Immediately.
A Republican State Representative is being recognized for his leadership.
Last week, Arizona State Representative Quang Nguyen, the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, announced that he was “among a select group of Republican legislators nationwide chosen for GOPAC’s 2024 Class of Emerging Leaders, an honor which recognizes a member’s strong sense of service, purpose, and effective leadership in the State Legislature.”
State Representative Quang Nguyen Named Among Nation’s Emerging Leaders
“In my time as a legislator, I’ve dedicated myself to addressing the challenges that our state and communities face,” said Representative @QuangNguyenAZ. “I very much look forward this unique opportunity… pic.twitter.com/9CRYvcMS3J
— Arizona House Republicans (@AZHouseGOP) April 16, 2024
In a statement to commemorate the news, Representative Nguyen said, “In my time as a legislator, I’ve dedicated myself to addressing the challenges that our state and communities face. I very much look forward to this unique opportunity presented with the Emerging Leaders Program and will seek to apply what I learn to my legislative efforts and serve the people of Arizona.”
According to the press release issued by Nguyen’s Office at the Arizona House of Representatives, the GOPAC Emerging Leaders Program “is an annual initiative designed to develop the next generation of Republican leadership. Candidates are nominated by their state’s legislative leaders and chosen by GOPAC for their potential to effect positive changes in their states and rise within Republicans ranks.”
Representative Nguyen serves Yavapai County in Legislative District 1.
Daniel Stefanski is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
On Monday, the Arizona Superior Court declared a mistrial in the case of George Alan Kelly, 75, the rancher who shot and killed an illegal immigrant trespassing his property.
The jury was unable to reach a verdict in Kelly’s case (CR-23-0026). Judge Thomas Fink scheduled a status reading for next Monday, April 29, to allow the state to determine whether it would request a retrial.
Fink read aloud a note from the jurors insisting that further deliberations wouldn’t resolve their deadlock.
The Santa Cruz County Attorney’s Office initially charged Kelly with first-degree murder for killing an illegal immigrant, 48-year-old Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, trespassing Kelly’s property in Nogales last January. Cuen-Buitimea had previously been convicted and deported several times. The attorney’s office later lowered the charge to second-degree murder.
According to court documents, discovery of Cuen-Buitimea’s remains occurred after Kelly had called law enforcement twice: once in the early afternoon to report illegal immigrants possibly firing shots on his property, and once that evening to report the discovery of Cuen-Buitimea’s remains. Cuen-Buitimea was found unarmed.
Kelly’s co-counsel, Kathy Lowthorp, told NewsNation post-verdict that the jury was 7-1 for a “not guilty” verdict. Only one juror believed that Kelly was guilty of second-degree murder. Their defense team unsuccessfully fought the mistrial ruling and supported extending jury deliberation. The prosecution supported the declaration of a mistrial.
The jurors opted to maintain their deadlock over a unanimous decision on either reckless manslaughter or negligent homicide, which Fink suggested.
The Arizona Superior Court posted all videos of the 18-day trial to their YouTube page; they have also posted relevant case documents to their website, which includes the minute entries outlining the main events in the trial. The trial began exactly a month ago.
During court proceedings, Kelly’s other co-counsel, Brenna Larkin, testified that Cuen-Buitimea was one among a group of five men trespassing his land with large backpacks and rifles. Larkin clarified that Kelly shot in the sky above the men to ward them off after hearing a shot fired, ostensibly by the group of men.
Larkin stated in closing arguments that Cuen-Buitimea posed a very real threat to Kelly and his wife.
“Long story short, this is simply not somebody who’s looking for the American dream,” said Larkin. “There’s no evidence that this person is here for those kinds of benign purposes.”
The prosecution’s key witness against Kelly — Daniel Ramirez, another in the group that trespassed Kelly’s land on that fateful day — has falsely told the court he had no prior drug-related convictions, though he was previously convicted of drug smuggling nearly a decade ago.
Kelly’s counsel further claimed that the prosecution had coached, editorialized, and mistranslated Ramirez’s testimony.
“It is particularly disturbing that the State either failed to review the witness’s criminal history prior to putting him on the stand, or the State concealed the witness’s criminal history,” stated Kelly’s counsel.
AP News reported that Nogales’ consul general of the Mexican consulate, Marcos Moreno Baez, waited with Cuen-Buitimea’s daughters on Monday after the verdict to meet with prosecutors.
AZ Free News is your #1 source for Arizona news and politics. You can send us news tips using this link.
The largest Christian university in the U.S., Grand Canyon University (GCU), defended itself against “disturbing and defamatory” public comments made by the U.S. Department of Education Secretary Miguel Cardona.
“Mr. Cardona’s inflammatory comments, which are legally and factually incorrect, are so reckless that GCU has no choice but to demand an immediate retraction,” the statement says. “He is either confused, misinformed or does not understand the actions taken by his own agency.”
At the House Appropriations Committee hearing last week, Cardona said “we are cracking down not only to shut them down, but to send a message to not prey on students.”
The Goldwater Institute filed a lawsuit on behalf of GCU in February due to the Biden administration imposing a $37 million fine on the school. The conservative think tank claims the administration has refused to provide documents that explain why it fined GCU.
“GCU has been asked repeatedly why it believes it is being targeted by federal agencies of the Biden Administration,” the school’s statement reads. “Here’s what we can tell you: Mr. Cardona’s inflammatory comments make very clear the Department of Education’s intentions and their disdain for institutions that do not fit their ideological agenda. What’s also clear is that ED has no lawful grounds to carry out those intentions based on their disingenuous and factually unsupportable allegations.”
The Education Department’s conduct extends normal regulatory activity, the statement says.
“It epitomizes the weaponization of federal agencies’ power against a private Christian university,” according to the statement.
GCU is confident an impartial court of law would exonerate it from the allegations.
“GCU’s intent is to fight these accusations all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary,” the statement says. “The Department of Education’s intent, based on the frivolous nature of its accusations and defamatory statements from ED officials, seems to be to damage the university’s reputation, use its ‘findings’ as a rationale to seek loan forgiveness for students under the borrower’s defense to repayment program and impose unprecedented fines and legal fees. In other words, regardless of the inevitable legal outcomes in GCU’s favor, the process becomes the punishment.”
GCU has more than 118,000 students. The Phoenix university says it will continue to thrive.
“With 118,000 students and growing, GCU is thriving and will continue to thrive. In an industry that is struggling and slow to change, GCU has created a model that has allowed it to freeze tuition on its ground campus for 16 straight years, increase diversity and social mobility by ensuring that higher education is affordable to all socioeconomic classes (over 40% of GCU’s ground campus student body are students of color), maintain lower student loan default rates than the national average and lower student debt levels than other private universities, and produce nearly 30,000 graduates in each of the past three years.”
The statement continued, “If a government-run institution produced those kinds of outcomes, it would be applauded. At the largest private Christian university in the country, it draws unwarranted threats from the Secretary of Education and the ire of the federal government.”
Elizabeth Troutman is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send her news tips using this link.
A Democratic Arizona congressman waved a Ukrainian flag on the House floor after the approval of additional Ukraine aid, though the Grand Canyon state is facing a crisis of its own.
Rep. Greg Stanton, D-Phoenix, waved a Ukrainian flag on the floor of the U.S. House on Saturday as members of his Democratic Party chanted “Ukraine.” Stanton joined a minority of Republicans in approving $60 billion in additional military aid for the Ukrainian government.
Phoenix radio personality, James T. Harris, raised questions about Stanton’s priorities. Arizona is currently the number one hotspot for illegal border crossings.
“Why [is] Congressman Greg Stanton from AZ waving a Ukrainian flag? What about the invasion on his Southern border?,” Harris said on Twitter.
Why Congressman Greg Stanton from AZ waving a Ukrainian flag? What about the invasion on his Southern border? pic.twitter.com/jzB1l1mUE2
During the first four months of fiscal year 2024, Border Patrol recorded more than 250,000 migrant apprehensions in the Tucson sector, the most of any region patrolled by the agency, according to federal government statistics.
Even House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., who pushed the aid bill, denounced the flag waving.
“These are not normal times here in the House or around the world, as we all know and we saw a disturbance on the House floor just a bit ago,” Johnson said of the demonstration. “I just want to say simply that I think most people around the country understand and agree we should only wave one flag on the House floor, and I think we know which flag that is.”
The bill, tying military aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan with humanitarian assistance for Gaza, was a victory for Johnson after he brought the proposals to the floor despite objections from his party. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., is leading a movement to oust the speaker.
The aid package passed on a 311 to 112 vote, with Arizona Republicans Juan Ciscomani and David Schweikert joining Ruben Gallego and Stanton in approving the measure. Gallego reportedly held a Ukraine flag but did not wave it.
Elizabeth Troutman is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send her news tips using this link.
