In reality, the degree of financial distress turns less on which party controls a statehouse or a city hall than on the number of Covid-19 cases, the kinds of businesses undergirding a state’s economy, and its tax structure.

It’s hard to overstate the gravity of the situation. A new report by the advocacy group Hunger Free America found that total SNAP caseloads in 33 states, including Arizona, jumped from 32 to 35 million in the pandemic’s early months.

If loving your neighbor and advocating for social justice by lifting up issues and helping to shape policy in Arizona is important to you, please consider supporting the ministry of Lutheran Advocacy Ministry Arizona (LAMA) with a donation today. We, as people of faith, can make a difference.

In southeastern Arizona, the continuing political divisiveness around the Trump administration’s signature construction project has pitted rancher against rancher and neighbor against neighbor in a state that a Democratic presidential candidate narrowly carried for the first time in decades.

Though Mr. Biden won the state, making him only the second Democrat presidential candidate to do so since 1948, he did so with the thinnest of margins, receiving roughly 11,000 votes or 0.3 percentage points more than Mr. Trump.

The 48-minute recording begins with devotions by Bishop Deborah Hutterer, followed by a personal story and remarks by Rev. Cho, then a Q&A section featuring both pre-submitted and impromptu questions by representatives from Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

Gov. Doug Ducey took to Twitter on Monday afternoon to announce the State of Arizona has enrolled hundreds of providers who are ready to administer a coronavirus vaccine. According to Gov. Ducey, Arizona should expect doses on the ground in mid to late December.

Voters in precincts on the Navajo and Hopi reservations in northeastern Arizona cast nearly 60,000 ballots in the Nov. 3 election, compared with just under 42,500 in 2016. Biden won Arizona by about 10,500 votes, according to unofficial results.

A range of coronavirus relief programs expire Dec. 31, and it's time to prepare for life without them.

Our voices are needed now more than ever in urging Congress to complete the bi-partisan negotiations to address COVID-19 before the holidays and congressional adjournment.

The Congressional Budget Office estimated in September that the number of people enrolled in Medicaid expansion will grow to 13.7 million people in 2021. The Urban Institute in an Oct. 15 report suggested that overturning the ACA would result in at least a 90 percent increase in the uninsured population for 25 of the expansion states.

President-elect Joe Biden is facing calls from anti-hunger groups to roll back some of the signature initiatives of the Trump administration, namely regulatory policies aimed at reducing the number of Americans eligible for food assistance.

On average, SNAP households received about $246 a month in fiscal year 2020, FRAC research shows. The average SNAP benefit per person was about $125 per month, which works out to about $1.39 per person per meal.

Pastors and faith leaders across the country are asked urgently to sign a letter to congressional leaders seeking for a COVID-19 relief package.

The presentations by Dr. Ryan Cumming of ELCA World Hunger and Ms. Angie Rogers of Arizona Food Bank Network for the LAMA Summit on November 7 were excellent ~ well worth viewing!

Arizona voters approved a ballot measure this week that will make the state’s tax code more equitable while raising hundreds of millions of dollars in badly needed revenue for schools. Two other sound, high-profile ballot measures — in Illinois and California — either failed or remain too close to call, but the Arizona victory joins New Jersey’s new “millionaires’ tax” as an example of equitable, antiracist fiscal policy that other states should follow.