Arizona Capitol Times Your Inside Source for Arizona Government, Politics and Business

FLAGSTAFF - An appeals court on Tuesday (July 22) rejected a challenge by environmentalists to change federal rules allowing the use of motorized rafts at the Grand Canyon.

Sen. Jon Kyl announced July 23 that he would vote against Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation to the U.S. Supreme Court, saying he is not convinced that she will set aside her biases and decide cases impartially based on the rule of law.

Charles Butler showed up for Homeless Court in a white shirt and tie. He wanted to make a good impression on the judge. Other defendants appeared in Polo shirts and, in one case, Bermuda shorts. "I guess I overdressed," Butler, 48, said.

Patrick Wade Bearup was not the person who delivered a beating to a Phoenix man in 2002, nor did shoot the man twice in the head on a dusty road near the old mining town of Crown King. But he ...

The lawsuit that led to the creation of the modern behavioral health care system in Maricopa County has created what many experts say is an artificial set of standards that ignores the real needs of patients. But confusion and disagreement over ways to improve the system have delayed the kind of meaningful reform that almost everyone in the health care community recognizes as necessary.

WASHINGTON - As President Obama's first nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court faced senators in open hearings last week, Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., emerged as a leading Republican voice in raising questions about Judge Sonia Sotomayor's record.

The Arizona Republican Party last year returned a six-figure contribution that came from an unregistered political committee, but nearly all of that money ended up back in the party's coffers before November's elections. Four business owners gave the state Republican Party a total of $90,000 last fall, only days after the party was forced to return $105,000 to a group known only as SCA.

TUCSON - Lawyers for former U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi have objected to a federal magistrate's denial of their motion to dismiss the public corruption case against him on constitutional grounds. Renzi's lawyers contend that the government violated the U.S. Constitution's "speech or debate" clause in wiretapping his conversations with aides concerning a failed land swap deal in which he's been accused of conspiracy.

On July 13, Governor Jan Brewer signed S1449 into law. The legislation, sponsored by Republican Sen. Linda Gray, applies retroactive effects to a 2006 law change that implemented what is known as "castle doctrine" into state law.

GREEN VALLEY - Humanitarian groups promise court action after they were ticketed for littering by federal agents.