Channing Turner of Cronkite News Service has the details:

PHOENIX — Several bills introduced by a conservative lawmaker would transform the way Maricopa and Pima counties select and retain judges, including putting the Senate in charge of confirming and deciding whether to retain them.

Opponents, including the former chief justice of the Arizona Supreme Court, have called the bills misguided and an attempt to inject politics into the judicial system. But Sen. Ron Gould, R-Lake Havasu City, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the current system needs to be reformed.

Gould authored 11 bills dealing with the way judges are selected and retained, including five that are still active.

While judges in smaller counties are selected and retained through elections, since 1974 Maricopa and Pima counties, which have populations larger than the current threshold of 250,000, have used a merit selection system that begins with nominating commissions.

Under the system, the governor appoints five attorneys from a pool vetted by the State Bar of Arizona and 10 members of the public to each county’s nominating commission. The Senate confirms each commission nomination.

When a judicial vacancy occurs, the commission selects at least three candidates judged most highly qualified to fill the position. The governor then makes a final appointment from those candidates.

SCR 1045 would have voters decide whether to remove the Bar Association’s power to select nomination committee member, while SCR 1040 would have voters decide whether to both eliminate Bar involvement and require Senate confirmation.

The incident grabbed national headlines, resulting in outrage from local residents who have expressed concern that Bundgaard, the second-highest ranking state senator, would use rules in the Arizona Constitution to avoid being taken into custody. Phoenix police have said Bundgaard told officers he could not be jailed because he was a state senator and the Legislature was in session.

Bundgaard, 43, on Wednesday said that he would not comment until he had read the police report. But Senate President Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, supported him, calling Bundgaard a "victim."

"I know what is going on. I think he is a victim of this whole thing. I feel bad for him. He certainly has paid the price," Pearce said, referring to the negative publicity.

Read the rest here.

Perhaps the most contentious issue it addresses is Bundgaard's insistence to the media that he did not ask for the legislative immunity granted by the Arizona Constitution, even though the PPD cut him loose while arresting Ballard and hauling her off to the Fourth Avenue Jail.

In the PPD's press release on the matter, Sergeant Tommy Thompson stated the following:

"After being taken into custody, Mr. Bundgaard informed the officers that he is an Arizona State Senator and as such, is immune from arrest, while the legislature is in session, which it currently is. Based upon Article IV, Part 2, Section 6 of the Arizona State Constitution, Mr. Bundgaard was correct and not arrested at that time however, the case will be submitted to the prosecutor's office for review."

So Bungaard's claim that he didn't invoke his legislative immunity appears to be lie, if you believe the cops.

This also raises questions about Bungaard's side of the story:

The struggle between Bundgaard and Ballard was obviously quite physical. According to the report, Bundgaard claims Ballard threatened to jump out of his gold Mercedes and threw his suit out of the car. When he stopped, Ballard jumped out, and he tried to put her back in. Or so he claims.

Bundgaard says Ballard began hitting him in the car. But Ballard states that while driving, Bundgaard "used his right arm in a swinging motion and hit Ms. Ballard over her chest. The strike caused bruising on the left upper chest area of Ms. Ballard. Ms. Ballard stated that he struck her twice."

Ballard admits that she struck him after she had been hit two times by Bundgaard. She also says Bundgaard pushed her out of the car. She told police he pushed her down at least twice, and she sustained scrapes to her right knee and hand.

Regarding Bundgaard, Officer Patterson concludes by stating, "I am requesting that the domestic violence assault charge be submitted on Senator Bundgaard when the [Legislature] is not in session."

Read the whole thing—including the police report—here.

E.J. Montini interviews the woman who went to jail while Bundgaard went home here:

Aubry Ballard is a small woman, not much over 100 pounds.

She sat across from me Monday afternoon at a Phoenix coffee shop where, hesitantly, she showed me the bruises on both sides of her chest, near her collar bones. And the bruises on her arms. And the scrapes on both knees.

“It has been a tough thing to go through,” she said. “But to see the things about me in the media. People saying I'm crazy. That's not me. I not a public person so I don't have experience in this. But that's not me.”

On Friday night, 34-year-old Ballard and her now former boyfriend, 43-year-old state Sen. Scott Bundgaard, were at a “Dancing with the Stars” charitable event. On the way home, their car was spotted on the side of the road and police responded to calls of a man pulling a woman from the vehicle. According to officers, because Bundgaard had a black eye and cut lip, and because of Ballard's injuries, to two of them were to be arrested for domestic violence.

Instead, Bundgaard used the get-out-of-jail-free card that lawmakers have while they're in session.

The state House on Monday approved and forwarded to the Senate two bills that would further limit abortion in Arizona.

HB 2416, sponsored by Rep. Kimberly Yee, R-Phoenix, would require doctors to perform an ultrasound at least one hour before an abortion and point out the fetus’ extremities and offer the woman an opportunity to listen to the heartbeat and take a photo home. It would also change the definition of abortion to include abortion by pill and would bar doctors from using telemedicine to administer abortion by pill remotely.

HB 2384, sponsored by Rep. Debbie Lesko, R-Glendale, would ban public funding or tax credits from being used to provide, pay for, promote, provide coverage of or provide referrals for abortions. It also would ban state universities and community colleges from using state funding or tuition money to train students to perform abortions.

Both bills passed with a 40-18 vote mostly along party lines, with all Republicans and Democrats Catherine Miranda of Phoenix and Anna Tovar of Tolleson voting in support. Tovar and Miranda didn’t explain their votes.

Rep. Matt Heinz, D-Tucson, a hospital doctor, spoke out against both measures, at one point even suggesting that the Legislature place an outright ban on abortion and let the courts decide rather than waste time considering abortion bills instead of the state’s suffering budget.

The sales-tax numbers look especially promising. In January of this year, retails sales were up 4 percent, so we’re shopping again. Restaurant and bar collections jumped by more than 10 percent, so we’re going out. Even the contracting tax collections saw up 4 percent bump, although it’s still lagging for the fiscal year. Overall, the state collected $9.2 million over the budget estimate.

The income-tax collections are also coming in ahead of forecast, but the report notes that wages and salaries don’t show much sign of growth, so the numbers might mean that Arizonans are having too much money taken out of their paychecks. (Cue the Tea Party outrage.)

The Range would just like to take a moment to point out that this economic performance undercuts the primary GOP economic theory, which is that higher taxes always inhibit economic growth—or, as we’ve heard it said, “Nobody ever taxed their way to prosperity.” In the last couple of years, Arizonans have increased their sales taxes by a penny per dollar and seen the return of a minor statewide property tax. If every tax increase is bad, those economic tremors should have sent the state’s economy into a tailspin.

Instead, the economy is bouncing back, albeit slowly.

There’s plenty that could still wreck it. Big government cuts still loom, both at the state and the federal level, which will result in job losses. And the state has already guaranteed future corporate tax cuts that will once again throw the budget out of whack. (Speaking of those corporate taxes: Year to date, corporate tax revenues are up 80 percent over the previous year and are $19 million above the forecast. So you can see how today’s oppressive rates are really holding back corporate profits and growth.)

If you're especially wonky, you can look over the report here.

"(Department of Health Services) just came out with reports for 2009 with numbers that show a higher number of abortions for minorities. It's both a statewide and national trend. ... Sex selection was studied by the National Academy of Science in March 2008, and research shows there is a strong son-bias in parts of America. There is clear evidence that this is happening."

The verdict:

Bottom line: Statewide statistics indicate there is not a higher percentage of abortions among minorities compared with White women. However, national statistics indicate a higher percentage of abortion among minorities. Although studies indicate sex selection is an issue, health organizations do not track the number of males or females aborted, so there is no data to support that claim.

Tessa Muggeridge of Cronkite News Service has details:

Following an hour of heated debate, the state House gave preliminary approval Monday to a bill that would ban abortions sought because of the fetus’ race or sex.

The measure, authored by Rep. Steve Montenegro, R-Litchfield Park, would require doctors performing abortions to sign affidavits stating that the reason for the abortion isn’t the fetus’ race or sex. It would allow the father, if married to the woman who gets an abortion, to sue the doctor if he believes the doctor knowingly performed it based on the race or sex. If the mother isn’t 18, the maternal grandparents would be able to sue.

Montenegro called race- and sex-selection abortions a violation of human rights, saying these abortions are often grisly, late-term surgeries. Democrats questioned whether such abortions are happening in the state, while Republicans said the measure would help end discrimination against unborn children.

Lauren Gambino with Cronkite News Service has more details at the East Valley Trib, including this argument from Clean Election's Todd Lang:

Lang argued against the bill before the Senate Judiciary Committee, pointing out that seven of the eight committee members had used Clean Elections money to fund their campaigns at some point during their careers.

“The door was opened for you through Clean Elections. Don’t close the door for others,” Lang said in his testimony. “Allow other folks to run, allow other folks to get their ideas out there into the marketplace of ideas and allow other folks to join the Legislature.”

Senator Russell Pearce in the Arizona Republic on the Supreme Court's 1982 decision Plyler vs. Doe, which addressed a Texas statute that prohibited public education funding for illegal aliens:

"It's not the law of the land when a Supreme Court issues a bad decision," Pearce said. "It's to be challenged and overturned."