Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting

Arizona voters approved in-state tuition for undocumented students. The state left implementation to chance.

After Arizona voters approved a 2022 ballot initiative granting in-state tuition to undocumented students, the state put no ...
AZCIR

Patients file grievances, experts want reforms at Arizona State Hospital

This project was funded in part by support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism. Isaac Contreras lives alone and he says it’s making him sick. He’s got a room and a bathroom to himself, but the ...
AZCIR

Dozens of people died in Arizona sober living homes as state officials fumbled Medicaid fraud response

Arizona officials acknowledged that a fraud scheme targeting Indigenous people with addictions cost taxpayers $2.5 billion. But they haven’t accounted publicly for the number of deaths tied to the ...
AZCIR

Border vigilantes are blurring the lines of law enforcement

This story is a collaboration between the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting and the Texas Observer. It was late afternoon when a small group traveling in a white Ford F-150 approached a ...
AZCIR

Investors, cannabis corporations acquire more social equity licenses as deadline to open dispensaries looms

As Arizona’s remaining social equity license holders scramble to open marijuana dispensaries before a looming October deadline, private investors and major cannabis corporations have continued to ...
AZCIR

Groundwater regulation weaknesses exploited by industrial-scale agriculture

ELFRIDA, Ariz. — Elaine Bailey stood at the microphone at the Sunsites Community Center in southeastern Arizona, voice shaking as she described the massive scale of new agricultural development next ...
AZCIR

Despite renewed attention, pregnancy and childbirth still deadly across Arizona

Get AZCIR’s latest investigations and updates delivered straight into your inbox, for free. It had been six weeks since Danielle Lerner delivered her second child via cesarean section in April 2019, ...
AZCIR

State leaders misled public about scope of Medicaid fraud crisis

Carmen Heredia resigned this week as director of the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System ahead of a state Senate confirmation hearing. Republican lawmakers had criticized her response to a ...
AZCIR

Experts warn of radicalization pipeline as Sedona wellness communities, anti-government groups share space

SEDONA—Natural light filtered through New Age tapestries covering skylights at the Ultimate Light Mission community center on the outskirts of Sedona, softening the afternoon sun as the woody ...
AZCIR

God-given rights: The nationwide spread of the ‘constitutional sheriff’

Get AZCIR’s latest investigations and updates delivered straight into your inbox, for free. GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Against the background hum of the convention center, Dar Leaf settled into a club ...
AZCIR

Permanent funding solution elusive as mental health provider shortage plagues Arizona schools

This article is published as part of the Mental Health Parity Collaborative, a national partnership between AZCIR and The Carter Center’s Rosalynn Carter Fellowships for Mental Health Journalism and ...
AZCIR

Border911: The misinformation network profiting off the false invasion narrative

Dark money and charity organizations led by former intelligence officers and ex-feds have been spreading propaganda and laying the groundwork for presidential election challenges. For a retired ...