Ron Barber (D) and Jesse Kelly (R) will be facing each other today in a closely watched special election that strategists in both parties consider somewhat of a bellwether for November. The winner will take the seat former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords vacated back in January to focus on her recovery from the serious injury she sustained a year earlier in a mass shooting at a Tucson shopping center.

One week after the pivotal Wisconsin recall election, southern Arizona will be holding a special election to replace Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, to serve the remainder of her term. Giffords resigned this year. The June 12 contest will be between Giffords' staffer Ron Barber and Giffords' 2010 opponent, Republican Jesse Kelly. 

Harvey Camacho and Randy Clarke, members of Communications Workers of America (CWA) Local 7026 in Tucson, Ariz., have won praise for their role in helping secure evidence crucial to the investigation of the Jan. 8 shooting rampage that killed six people and wounded 13 others, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says that Saturday’s Tucson, Ariz., assassination attempt against Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) and the murder of six of her constituents:

serves as a terrible reminder to all of our political and civic leaders about the need to end the use of appeals to violence in our political rhetoric. We must find ways to passionately debate and even disagree with each other without using words that can give unstable individuals an incitement to engage in violent acts.

Here’s a statement from Rebekah Friend, executive director and secretary/treasurer of the Arizona AFL-CIO, about today’s tragedy in Tuscon, Ariz., in which a gunman shot Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in the head as she met outside a grocery store with constituents. The gunman, who is in custody, also allegedly shot and killed Chief Judge John Roll of the U.S. District Court for Arizona and an unidentified nine-year-old girl.