Doris “Dorie” Miller was an unlikely hero — a mess attendant, second class, from Waco whose race precluded him from serving in a combat assignment. But when the Japanese hit the USS West Virginia at Pearl Harbor, he manned a machine gun he’d not been trained on and ended up pulling the ship’s captain and many others to shelter.

WASHINGTON – Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid insisted Wednesday that a bill to combat human trafficking, previously noted for its bipartisan support, will not pass unless anti-abortion language is removed. “Unless that language is taken out of the bill, there will be no bill,” Reid said on the Senate floor this afternoon, a sharp turn from Monday, when he predicted little or no resistance on the bill.

The Army announced Friday that it will award the Purple Heart to victims of the 2009 Fort Hood shooting, after years of resistance. Texas lawmakers welcomed news that the shooting spree, which left 13 people dead and more than 30 wounded, would no longer be classified as an act of “workplace violence,” given the shooter proclaimed himself a jihadi.

While justices heard arguments in the latest case dealing with the Affordable Care Act, Texas woman Delma Limones spoke at a rally outside the Supreme Court Wednesday about the case’s potential impact on women in Texas. Limones, 22, is a student at Texas State University living in Austin who hasn’t had health insurance for the past four years.

Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., announced a bipartisan plan Tuesday to reform the nation’s prison system. “We know that our prisons are overcrowded and pretty much everyone agrees that recidivism, the percentage of which people repeat crimes, is way too high,” Cornyn said at a Capitol news conference.

Click on the graphic above to see the relative growth in children coming to the U.S. from Guatemala every year, and the shrinking number being returned, based on data from the two countries. Homeland Security secretary details response to flood of immigrant children on Southwest border. WASHINGTON – The White House and Department of Homeland Security have mounted a campaign in recent days to tell children who cross the border they will not be eligible for deferred action and will be sent home.

The Department of Homeland Security's schedule for phasing in enforcement of the Real ID law, when driver's licenses from Real ID-compliant states - Arizona does not comply - would be needed to access these areas: Restricted areas of Department of Homeland Security headquarters: Effective April 21, 2014.

The state congressional delegations that took the most privately funded trips per member, on average, since January 2013: The 11 members of Arizona's congressional delegation took an average of 1.9 privately funded trips, which cost $8,144.36 on average in this Congress. The number of trips and total cost per member, rounded to the nearest dollar:

WASHINGTON – They didn't get to demonstrate their project for President Barack Obama, but three Phoenix teens were not complaining after their trip this week to the fourth White House Science Fair.

WASHINGTON – A tentative agreement between House and Senate negotiators on a multibillion-dollar plan to help the ailing Department of Veterans Affairs includes $20.7 million for a community-based outpatient clinic in Phoenix. The clinic was one of 27 specific projects, worth more than $230 million, included in the agreement Monday that is aimed at fixing headline-grabbing problems in veterans’ health care that first came to light at the Phoenix facility.

WASHINGTON – The number of unaccompanied minors crossing the Southwest border has skyrocketed in the past year, but fewer of these immigrants are coming through Arizona, the most recent government figures show. The change for youths is part of a larger shift of illegal immigration eastward, toward Texas, which is easier to reach for the immigrants increasingly coming from Central America, and where they are likely to face less border enforcement.

A scorecard by immigration advocates on House members votes on immigration-related measures split the Arizona delegation on party lines, with all four Republicans getting a zero and Democrats getting no less than an 73. WASHINGTON – All four Republican representatives from Arizona got a zero on a new national scorecard that rated all House members for their votes on nine immigration-related measures and statements on the issue.