Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting

The Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting is a nonprofit media organization that operates independently, focusing on accountability journalism throughout Arizona. The goal of AZCIR is to create, support, and advance investigative journalism by engaging in original and collaborative reporting, hosting public events, and providing training, all aimed at improving our communities.

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New law increases oversight of Arizona sober living homes

2 months ago | azcir.org | Mary Hudetz

New Arizona legislation increases oversight of sober living homes two years after a Medicaid fraud scheme targeted Native Americans.
Arizona child care assistance waitlist returns for thousands

Feb 17, 2025 | azcir.org | Maria Polletta

More than 2,000 Arizona children have been waitlisted for state child care assistance, according to the Department of Economic Security, and that number is likely to climb as the agency reviews pending applications. The waitlist counts, quietly added to the DES website after weeks of inquiries from AZCIR, publicly quantify for the first time the impact of state lawmakers’ failure to fill a gaping budget hole left by expiring federal pandemic funds last year.
FACT BRIEF: Did California Gov. Gavin Newsom require Arizona firefighting vehicles to get emission tests before allowing them to aid in the Los Angeles wildfires?

Jan 16, 2025 | azcir.org | Carmela Guaglianone

Fire trucks from Arizona did not have to undergo emissions testing prior to supporting crews fighting wildfires in Los Angeles. As a part of CAL FIRE protocol, these vehicles are subject to routine maintenance checks after long drives. Emissions tests are not a part of this inspection. Arizona has sent dozens of trucks and around 150 firefighters to help contain fires in Los Angeles since January 8.
Lawman-turned-propagandist pushing Trump’s border agenda

Jan 14, 2025 | azcir.org | Francesca D'Annunzio |Melissa del Bosque |Monica Camacho

Editor’s note: This report is part of “Seeds of Distrust,” an investigative collaboration between reporters and editors at five nonprofit news organizations: the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting, Lighthouse Reports, palabra, Puente News Collaborative, and the Texas Observer. Jaeson Jones is trained as a cop—not a journalist. Yet the 51-year-old holds a lucrative correspondent contract at one of the country’s most prominent MAGA-aligned television networks.
FACT BRIEF: Did federal officials order Arizona to remove a makeshift portion border of the wall made of shipping crates?

Jan 13, 2025 | azcir.org | Carmela Guaglianone

A stretch of border barrier constructed in 2022 under then-Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey was later removed following pushback from the federal government. The barrier, assembled using shipping containers and barbed wire, spanned unfenced sections of the state’s shared border with Mexico. The barrier ran through lands belonging to the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Reclamation, which are under the jurisdiction of the federal government.
FACT BRIEF: Is Texas the only state in U.S. history to construct segments of its own barrier along the Southern Border?

Jan 10, 2025 | azcir.org | Carmela Guaglianone

While Texas was the first state to start building a barrier along its border with Mexico, it’s not the only one to have done so. In 2022, Arizona’s then-Gov. Doug Ducey had hundreds of defunct shipping containers repurposed into a makeshift border wall. The barrier was constructed partially on national forest land without federal authorization, and the Biden Administration ultimately succeeded in forcing the state to remove the crates.
Do the 10 U.S. states with the highest maternal mortality rates have abortion bans?

Jan 2, 2025 | azcir.org | Carmela Guaglianone

Though nine of the 10 states with the highest maternal mortality rates—Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Tennessee—have total or near-total abortion bans in place, one does not. Virginia allows abortions until the third trimester. Maternal mortality rankings rely on U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data from 2018-2022, the most recent available.
Is the Biden administration selling materials the Trump administration bought to build a border wall?

Dec 20, 2024 | azcir.org | Carmela Guaglianone

Materials initially purchased by the Trump administration for the former president’s border wall project have been listed for auction and sold on a government surplus marketplace, GovPlanet. The Biden Administration paused construction on the border wall in 2021. The supplies are being sold under a federal law requiring the Department of Defense to create and enact a plan to use, transfer or donate stored materials to states along the southern border.
Did the maternal mortality rate in the U.S. nearly double between 2014-2021?

Dec 20, 2024 | azcir.org | Carmela Guaglianone

Between 2014 and 2021, the maternal mortality rate, the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births, nearly doubled in the United States, according to a study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention define maternal deaths as those occurring during or within 42 days of pregnancy from causes related to or exacerbated by pregnancy.
Lack of coordination hinders state response to maternal mortality

Dec 20, 2024 | azcir.org | Carmela Guaglianone

AZCIR is part of the Mental Health Parity Collaborative, a group of newsrooms that are covering stories on mental health care access and inequities in the U.S. The national partnership includes The Carter Center and newsrooms in select states throughout the nation. In 2019, federal officials dedicated more than $2 million to Arizona’s Maternal Mortality Review Committee as part of a national effort to confront alarmingly high rates of maternal deaths.