KJZZ's Sun Up is a weekday morning podcast giving you the Arizona news you need to start your day. It is the biggest stories of the day from KJZZ.
Transcript
Bruce Drummond: This is KJZZ’s Sun Up, your daily news update from Phoenix, the state, and the region. Good morning, I’m Bruce Drummond, Phil’s away for a few days. This podcast is a daily digest of Arizona news as reported by the KJZZ news team. It’s the dreaded tax day, April 15th, but it’s a Wednesday, so we’re halfway to the weekend. Let’s see what’s happening in the news.
New records show Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap corresponded with the US Department of Justice last year about election records and litigation, as the department sought to investigate the county’s past elections. From the politics desk, Wayne Schutsky has details.
Wayne Schutsky: Votebeat reported on records that show Heap raised alarm bells in August over concerns that county IT staff was planning to delete records from the 2020 and 2022 elections. The records show Heap's assistant scheduled a meeting with the US attorney for Arizona later that month. Around the same time, other DOJ officials began threatening to take legal action against Secretary of State Adrian Fontes in an attempt to secure Arizona’s voter rolls. The DOJ later sent a letter to the county instructing it to preserve election records over claims the elections department engaged in, quote, "malfeasance." Records show Heap supported those efforts, though critics say it’s part of President Trump’s long-standing attempts to sow doubt in Arizona’s elections after he lost the state in 2020. Wayne Schutsky, KJZZ news, Phoenix.
Bruce Drummond: Federal water managers are soon expected to announce a plan that would prop up Lake Powell. Alex Hager reports it’s an effort to protect Glen Canyon Dam in Northern Arizona, where water levels are dangerously low after a dry winter.
Alex Hager: The plan would send Colorado River water into Powell from upstream reservoirs. It would limit the amount that’s released downstream towards the Grand Canyon and Lake Mead. Arizona’s top water negotiator, Tom Buschatzke, says it’s only possible because Arizona, California, and Nevada cut back on water use.
Tom Buschatzke: We, in the lower basin, were proactive, reduced our water use, propped up the elevation of Lake Mead, that’s allowing this federal plan to go forward.
Alex Hager: Buschatzke called on the upper basin states of Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, and New Mexico to do more to keep water in Lake Powell. He said this reshuffling of water would be a short-term fix and won’t push Colorado River states any closer to a new deal about sharing water. Alex Hager, KJZZ news, Phoenix.
Bruce Drummond: Officials in Flagstaff say ICE is leasing space at an industrial building within city limits. Officials with the city and the Flagstaff Police Department say the agency has confirmed a lease agreement for two suites at a business complex in the city’s west side. Eva Putzova, with the advocacy group Keep Flagstaff Together, says the lack of information is causing fear in immigrant communities.
Eva Putzova: I think it's going to make it much harder for people to make a living, and kids will be missing school because the parents, obviously, they will be very cautious.
Bruce Drummond: ICE did not respond to questions about its plans for the site. Earlier this month, the Department of Homeland Security put out a call for vendors to provide office space in multiple US cities, including eight in Arizona.
Arizona is now one of the least affordable states in the US, according to a new report from the Common Sense Institute, a conservative-leaning Arizona policy organization. Catherine Davis-Young has more.
Katherine Davis-Young: The report considered costs for housing, utilities, gas, groceries, childcare, insurance, and taxes. Based on those expenses, Arizona ranked 45th among states for affordability. The report notes Arizona has become less affordable just in the last few years. Pre-pandemic, the state ranked 33rd for affordability, but Arizona households now must spend about $19,000 more per year on essentials than they did in 2019. The report says Arizona is still feeling the impact of post-pandemic inflation, especially when it comes to housing prices. Catherine Davis-Young, KJZZ news, Phoenix.
Bruce Drummond: Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed a bill Monday that would have opted Arizona into a federal tax credit program to fund private school scholarships. From the politics team, Cameron Sanchez has more.
Cameron Sanchez: Individuals in states that opt into the program can get $1,700 worth of tax credits for donating to scholarship granting organizations—nonprofits that fund private school tuition scholarships. The credit is a federal school choice program. It’s supported by Republican lawmakers like State Senator Shawnna Bolick, who says it’s foolish to leave money on the table for other states.
Shawnna Bolick: With the veto, that means that whenever these programs start popping up in other states around us, taxpayers here can, you know, get a tax credit at the federal level to send their dollars to Texas, Louisiana, Virginia, Florida, Tennessee, etc.
Cameron Sanchez: The state already has a universal private school voucher program funded by Arizona taxpayer dollars. Hobbs said in her veto letter that it would be irresponsible to join now before the federal government has created clear regulatory guidance. Cameron Sanchez, KJZZ news, Phoenix.
Bruce Drummond: The Navajo County Board of Supervisors selected Republican lawmaker David Marshall to fill a vacancy in the county recorder’s office. Representative Walter Blackman, Marshall’s seatmate at the legislature, says Marshall was excited about the job, especially because it will mean he can work closer to his home in Northern Arizona.
Walter Blackman: The stars lined it up for him, I guess, you know, so he'll be home with his family. The recorder job, he's got some interest in it, I think he'll make a pretty good recorder.
Bruce Drummond: If he accepts the job, Marshall will be the second member of the legislature’s Trump-aligned Freedom Caucus to take over a county recorder’s office, which help administer elections in Arizona. An election attorney told KJZZ that state law requires Marshall to resign from the legislature before taking the county job, but some have argued the state constitution bars lawmakers from holding other offices until their legislative term ends, whether or not they resign.
A report this week from the group Human Rights First shows the number of ICE deportation flights hit record numbers again last month, even in the midst of the partial government shutdown. From the Fronteras Desk, Alisa Reznick has more.
Alisa Reznick: Human Rights First releases monthly reports of ICE deportation and transfer flights leaving airports around the US. The latest report shows the number of flights continued to climb last month, even as the partial government shutdown cut funding for other Homeland Security agencies, like TSA, and exacerbated wait times for commercial flights. 225 ICE removal flights flew to 46 countries in March. Domestic transfers remain historically high at more than 1,200. This month also saw more people being deported to countries other than their own. Two such flights out of Phoenix sent a group of deportees to Eswatini in Southern Africa and Poland. Alisa Reznick, KJZZ news, Tucson.
Bruce Drummond: Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs signed Cade’s Law, "If You See Something, Say Something," which aims to hold accountable adults who use social media or texts to push a child to take their own life. Kathy Ritchie reports.
Kathy Ritchie: The law now gives prosecutors clear authority to charge adults who use targeted online messages to encourage a minor to commit suicide. Republican Representative Pamela Carter was the bill’s sponsor. In a statement, she said Cade’s Law closes a dangerous loophole by extending accountability to an adult who uses words through direct messages, texts, or social media posts aimed at a specific minor. The law was inspired by 16-year-old Cade Keller, who posted online that he planned to take his life before doing so in 2022. Kathy Ritchie, KJZZ news, Phoenix.
Bruce Drummond: A member of the Chandler City Council is calling for the swift completion of an internal review of an off-duty Phoenix police sergeant’s behavior at a student protest against ICE in January. Matthew Casey reports.
Matthew Casey: Councilman OD Harris also wants Sergeant Dustin Mullen to apologize for coming to the Chandler protest masked and armed, allegedly intent on getting students to assault him so they’d be arrested.
OD Harris: These are the same actions that got Phoenix into trouble before with the DOJ.
Matthew Casey: Harris is referring to a now-retracted civil rights review, which found that Phoenix police retaliated against protesters with violence and bogus allegations. Mullen was not on duty while in Chandler.
OD Harris: Yeah, he had the First Amendment right to counter-protest, but public servants are held to a higher standard.
Matthew Casey: Mullen is under internal investigation and on paid leave. He may face discipline from the Phoenix police chief. Matthew Casey, KJZZ news, Phoenix.
Bruce Drummond: When wildland firefighters are on prescribed fires, they’re breathing the same smoke and facing many of the same hazards found on wildfires, but they don’t get the same hazard pay. The Mountain West News Bureau’s Murphy Woodhouse reports that could soon change.
Murphy Woodhouse: Resolving that disparity has been a long-standing demand of wildland firefighters. In its proposal to do just that this week, the federal government acknowledges the real dangers of prescribed fire: open flame, falling trees, unstable terrain, and significant exposure to smoke and other toxins.
Max Alonzo: The hazards of a prescribed fire are very similar to the hazards of a suppression fire.
Murphy Woodhouse: That’s Max Alonzo, Secretary-Treasurer of the National Federation of Federal Employees, a union that represents many wildland firefighters. Firefighters make most of their money in the heavy summer months. Having a pay bump for prescribed fire work in the off-season, he says, is:
Max Alonzo: Really going to help them out in the wintertime, it’s going to keep these career wildland firefighters around.
Murphy Woodhouse: Comments on the proposal, which would give firefighters an extra 25% of their base pay on prescribed fires, will be accepted through June 15th. For the Mountain West News Bureau, I’m Murphy Woodhouse.
Bruce Drummond: In sports, the Suns lost their NBA play-in tournament game against the Portland Trail Blazers last night in downtown Phoenix, 114 to 110. The Blazers hit 17 three-pointers in the game and overcame an 11-point deficit in the last six minutes to clinch the seventh seed in the playoffs. The Suns are still alive, though. On Friday, they’ll host the winner of tonight’s Clippers-Warriors game for a shot at the eighth and final playoff spot.
And in baseball, a four-run fifth inning helped the Diamondbacks beat the Orioles 4 to 3 last night in Baltimore. Ildemaro Vargas knocked a three-run homer in the fifth to give Arizona the lead in the game, and they held on to win. The series in Baltimore continues with an early game today; first pitch in that one is this morning at 9:35 Arizona time.
And that’s it for this Wednesday version of KJZZ’s Sun Up, Arizona’s morning news podcast for April 15th. I’m Bruce Drummond.
