On June 13, the U.S. Department of Justice released a long-anticipated report on its investigation into the city of Phoenix and its Police Department. 

Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division laid out the results of the 126-page report after a nearly three-year investigation.

Thus far, the reaction from the majority of Phoenix City Council has been fairly muted. Police union officials categorically denied those allegations.

In this episode of The Gaggle, hosts Ron Hansen and Mary Jo Pitzl sit down with The Republic's criminal justice reporter Miguel Torres and Phoenix reporter Taylor Seely to dig further into the report and what the political reaction has been so far.

Read the full story on the DOJ report on The Arizona Republic at azcentral.com.

Episode transcript can be found here.

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At least $2.3 billion has been milked from Arizona taxpayers since 2019 in a shocking fake rehab program that mainly targeted Indigenous communities. 

Scammers posing as legitimate workers or counselors for sober living communities in Phoenix would patrol areas where Native Americans would gather to buy and consume alcohol. They would then pick up people who were intoxicated on drugs or alcohol and take them to Phoenix. Once there they'd have them sign up for the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System, or AHCCS. Once signed up, the victims would have their AHCCS accounts billed for alleged mental health treatment or addiction rehabilitation. But none of these treatments were ever provided.

But the fraud cut deeper than just loss of money. Victims found themselves stranded in the Valley, blackmailed and with no real support. Some even lost their lives in these fake sober living homes.

"For years, these providers have allegedly defrauded the state of millions of dollars while creating a large-scale humanitarian crisis that disproportionately affects Arizona’s tribal communities," Gov. Katie Hobbs said at a press meeting.

"This is tragic," Attorney General Kris Mayes added. "What has happened is tragic and outrageous. And, and I’ll just speak for myself as the attorney general of this state, I believe the state of Arizona owes our tribal nations an apology. 

In this episode of The Gaggle, host Mary Jo Pitzl sits down with the reporters who covered the story: Stephanie Innes, Arlyssa Becenti, and Richard Ruelas. 

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Judges are getting more scrutiny these days, from the U.S. Supreme Court to Arizona’s top justices to local jurists.

U.S. Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas have been the topic of numerous news stories that raise ethical questions about the justices' actions as members of the high court. 

In southeastern Arizona, Cochise County Judge John Kelliher Jr. has drawn outsize attention for his conduct: Four formal complaints about this courtroom demeanor in two years.

What does all of this mean for the public confidence in the judicial system? Are we reaching a tipping point of lack of confidence more broadly? Or is this just all par for the course in a time of political teeth-gnashing?

In this episode of the Gaggle, we prob those questions and more. Hosts Ron Hansen and Mary Jo Pitzl sit down first with Arizona Republic reporter Sarah Lapidus. She has followed Kelliher’s track record with the Judicial Conduct Commission and explains why he continues to draw complaints that lead to high-profile reprimands.

Then, Keith Swisher, a professor of legal ethics at the University of Arizona James E. Rogers School of Law, shares his views on what is going on at this moment in time and how the judicial process is perceived.

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Arizona is just two months away from the July primary. Voters will decide who represents them on the November ballot for the Republican and Democratic parties. But the results of that election will require a little bit of patience.

All 15 Arizona counties are looking for more poll workers to volunteer before the primary as millions of Arizonans are expected to vote. The state's largest counties say recruiting is going smoothly, but the sweltering heat, summer vacations and the popularity of a presidential election is expected to bring in more volunteers in November.

In February, the Legislature passed a law that would guarantee the state's new recount margin wouldn't impact the deadlines. Because of this, the primary election was moved from its usual spot in August to July 30 for the first time this year.

An early election does mean earlier results, but not necessarily fast results. The new election calendar comes with a provision that mandates poll workers in every county to hand count the number of ballots turned in on Election Day.

This is not a hand count of results, but to double-check the number of early ballot envelopes dropped off by voters.

This week on Election Dissection, an elections series of The Gaggle podcast by The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, hosts Mary Jo Pitzl and Sasha Hupka go through the themes heading into the July primary and what you need to know before heading to the polls.

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It’s the home stretch of the legislative session. Maybe.

Lawmakers are running out of bills to vote on, and budget talks are slogging along behind closed doors. The House is in the midst of a two-week break. But there is one exception to this very unhurried schedule: Ballot referrals.

These are proposed laws that go directly to the voters, avoiding the governor and her veto stamp. Others are amendments to the state Constitution, which require a vote of the people.

This month, two new referrals popped up like blooms on a saguaro cactus. Why are these measures showing up months into the legislative session? 

In this episode of The Gaggle, host Mary Jo Pitzl is joined by Paul Bentz, pollster for the political consulting firm HighGround. Together they discuss what might find its way onto the ballot this year and why Arizonans could expect a longer-than-normal ballot.

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The 2024 presidential race, Arizona’s congressional races and potentially several abortion-related measures command a lot of attention this election year. But there’s another set of really important races that are also on the ballot: the Legislature.

Republicans have two-seat majorities in both the Arizona House and Senate. That means if Democrats could make a net gain of even one seat in either chamber, Arizona would have a divided government that mirrors the house and senate in washington. And if they pick up control in both chambers, well, that would be the first time since the 1960s, so we can only wonder what that might be like in this long-red state.

In this episode of The Gaggle, hosts Ron Hansen and Mary Jo Pitzl sit down with The Republic's Ray Stern to discuss where Democrats have to win if they really intend to flip control of the Legislature and who is trying to do it. But first, in several key districts, we have to get through some competitive primary races. 

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Republicans have always had the numerical advantage in Arizona. A little more than a third of the state is registered with the GOP. But Republicans have slowly yet steadily lost ground to Democrats in this state. Why is that?

It's more than just changing demographics.

In this episode of The Gaggle, hosts Ron Hansen and Mary Jo Pitzl sit down with Samara Klar, a political science professor at the University of Arizona to tease apart Arizona voter's preferences.

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In a U.S. Senate race often dominated by Republican front runner Kari Lake, it’s easy to forget that Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb is running for the GOP nomination, too. He’s got a low-key demeanor and his personal style doesn’t seem to linger the way Lake’s combative politics does.

When Lake entered the Senate race in November with former President Donald Trump’s prominent endorsement, many people thought the nominating race was over. But Lamb has stuck around.

In this episode of The Gaggle, Sheriff Lamb shares his views in an exclusive interview on the 1864 abortion law, why he wouldn’t have voted for Senator Kyrsten Sinema’s bipartisan border security bill and ultimately why he wants your vote on the July 30 primary.

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On Wednesday, April 24th, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes shared a video on X, formerly Twitter, announcing that 11 Arizona Republicans and seven others have been charged for falsely certifying that Donald Trump won the state in 2020. This is despite of the fact that Arizonans narrowly favored Joe Biden. 

While the names of those charged have yet to be officially revealed, clues in the the 58 page indictment make it clear that the architects of Trump's national campaign to steal the election are also facing charges in Arizona. Some of those individuals appear to be Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, former chief of staff Mark Meadows, lawyers Jenna Ellis and Christina Bobb, and Trump advisers Boris Epshteyn and Michael Roman.

Trump, who is asking voters to return him to the White House this year, is “unindicted coconspirator 1,” according to the indictment.

In this special episode of The Gaggle, state politics reporters Mary Jo Pitzl and Stacey Barchenger sit down at The Republic's capitol bureau to hash out what we know from the indictment and what may happen next. 

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Artificial intelligence is a booming business. With a few dollars anyone can create a deep faked voice online. ChatGPT and other AI writing programs can take a student essay and polish it to a Ph.D. level. Manipulated videos can show an official saying or doing something outrageous -- and fake.

With such powerful technology at everyone's fingertips the question arises: how can we keep our election systems safe from bad actors using AI?

In this episode, our election dissectors, Mary Jo Pitzl and Sasha Hupka, speak with Don Palmer, the vice chair of the Election Assistance Commission. This is a bipartisan commission that was created by the Help America Vote Act of 2002, and it is tasked with certifying voting systems across the country. It also supports state and local election officials in their efforts to ensure accessible, accurate and secure elections.

Palmer explains both the pros and cons of AI and why it's important to set parameters on how it can be used. You will also hear an example of deep faked voices of our hosts. Listen closely and see if you can tell the AI from the real voices.

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