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Photo by Parker Michels-Boyce | Virginia Mercury/States Newsroom via Arizona Mirror

WASHINGTON — The next wave of the massive COVID-19 vaccination campaign could begin as soon as next week, after federal regulators decide if elementary school students across the U.S. should begin rolling up their tiny sleeves.

That multistep approval process kicks off Tuesday, when the Food & Drug Administration’s panel of vaccine experts will vote on whether the benefits of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine outweigh the risks for kids ages 5 to 11.

If the panel and top FDA officials grant an emergency authorization for vaccinating that age group, then the next step lies with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A CDC panel would meet on Nov. 2 and 3 to craft additional guidance on how the shot would be used.

For parents with children in that age group, that could mean a vaccination appointment for their child as soon as Nov. 4. The Biden administration has said there will be 15 million doses ready to ship as soon as the FDA gives the green light.

In recognition of the difficulty parents may have deciding whether to obtain a vaccine, the administration also is taking care to connect parents with trusted providers like pediatricians. “These are our babies, and they still feel like a baby when they’re that age and that size,” said Amy Wimpey Knight, president of the Children’s Hospital Association. 

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Nick Youngson |CC BY-SA 3.0 / Alpha Stock Images via Arizona Mirror

Time is running out for Senate Democrats to deliver millions of undocumented immigrants a path to citizenship that their families and advocates nationwide have been clamoring for years, and some business leaders in Arizona are emphasizing the economic benefits of a path to legalization.

In a letter to U.S. Sens. Mark Kelly and Kyrsten Sinema, 32 business leaders, elected officials and heads of nonprofits asked them to ignore the recommendations from the Senate parliamentarian, who twice rejected a plan to include a pathway to citizenship in a budget reconciliation plan.

“It has never been more urgent to achieve immigration reform to boost our economy, address our labor shortage, level the playing field for all workers and to support families,” the letter read. “The urgency is clear, the benefits are undeniable, the legislative vehicle is on the table and there is bipartisan popular support for action. We can not let this opportunity slip away. Our nation can’t afford (that) and neither can Arizona.”

Former Republican state senator Bob Worsley organized the coalition that signed the letter, which includes executives of real estate, construction and retail companies, Mesa Mayor John Giles, and Nogales councilwoman Liza Montiel.

“We have less than a couple of weeks to try to get some immigration reform into reconciliation,” Worsely said. “I’m afraid that, if we don’t get something in there, we are back to square one where we were earlier this year after Biden was elected.”

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Screenshot via Bitchute

Ron Watkins

Five days before Ron Watkins, the notorious MAGA conspiracy theorist who helped spread the violent far-right QAnon conspiracy, posted a video to his Telegram account announcing his candidacy for a rural Arizona congressional district, he registered to vote in Maricopa County. 

Watkins, who is widely believed to have been behind QAnon’s master account, has been making national headlines for his congressional bid in Arizona where he is attempting to unseat Democratic Congressman Tom O’Halleran in a large, rural district that encompasses a large portion of the state. 

However, that district won’t exist in 2022: All of the state’s districts are being redrawn by the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, and final decisions won’t be made until the end of the year.

The Arizona Mirror obtained a copy of Watkins’ voter registration information through the state’s public records law. It shows Watkins registered to vote in Maricopa County on Oct. 9, at a condominium in the Biltmore neighborhood of Phoenix. Property records show that the property is owned by Liz Harris, a Republican who lost a bid for the state legislature in 2020 and has since become a leading proponent of false claims that widespread fraud changed the election’s results. 

Harris is also the real estate agent for the property, which was listed for sale in August. Online realty websites show the condominium is priced at about $287,000 and that a sale is pending. It’s unclear if Watkins is purchasing the property.

Harris has been the driving force behind a group of conservatives who have canvassed Maricopa County and other parts of the state to identify alleged voter fraud. But the report she spearheaded based on that door-to-door scouring was rife with errors, including listing areas that had homes on it as vacant lots and lacking other corroborating information. 

But who exactly is Watkins? And how is a man who has spent the past decade living in Japan, China and the Philippines able to run for higher office in Arizona? 

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Gage Skidmore

Mark Finchem is peddling conspiracy theories, again.

In late September, the Republican-backed “audit” of votes in Maricopa County confirmed—yet again—that Joe Biden had legitimately won the electoral votes of the State of Arizona. To summarize: This was an unprecedented extra review of votes based in conspiracy theories that happened after certification of the results by the (Republican-led) Board of Supervisors, conducted by a company who had never audited an election before and whose founder claimed the election was rigged beforeconducting the audit—all while costing Maricopa County millions of dollars in the process.

The entire recount was a mess and a circus. An expensive mess and circus. Despite a prior agreement to cover expenses, GOP state senators forced the Maricopa County and taxpayers to foot the bill for new voting machines following the audit under threat of the state government pulling hundreds of millions in revenue sharing funds.

We should not let a similar costly frivolity occur here in Pima County.

Sadly, the cancerous movement to hamper Arizona democracy is somehow still growing. Conspiracy-fueled advocates of “Stop the Steal” have yet to back down despite the fact that even the partisan-led, amateurishly handled Cyber Ninjas report demonstrated no evidence of widespread voter fraud. State Senate President Karen Fann can claim any nonsense she wants, but Arizona’s election was completely aboveboard.

Still, on Friday Oct. 15, the GOP push to invalidate the legitimate results of the Arizona 2020 Presidential Election returned in force. An e-mail statement from former President Donald Trump claimed that “A new analysis of mail-in ballots in Pima County, Arizona means the election was Rigged and Stolen [sic] from the Republican Party in 2020, and in particular, its Presidential Candidate.” This is patently false, but what’s new?

Just when you thought talk of an Arizona recount was dead… here we go again.