Daisy Gonzalez-Perez/Cronkite News

Phoenix Mercury star Brittney Griner is one of the faces — and the only woman — depicted on a mural in Washington, D.C., dedicated to Americans held hostage or wrongfully detailed overseas.

It’s a new year and that means the Editorial Board of The Arizona Republic is announcing its Arizonan of the Year. And this year’s is someone who captured all of our attention intensely this year as her life hung in the balance between two world powers and a brutal war: Brittney Griner.

Griner went to Russia a week before the Russian Army invaded Ukraine, and Customs officials found vape cartridges with small amounts of cannabis oil in her luggage. She was arrested — and then convicted. Her fate in the hands of one of the world’s most brutal authoritarians, Vladimir Putin. 

Editorial Page Editor Elvia Diaz joins us now to talk more about Griner and why she is their Arizonan of the Year. 

Arizona Republic

Elvia Díaz

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