Turmoil in ’25: 10 tales that dominated San Antonio’s information cycle this 12 months

General, 2025 was a darkish 12 months for native, state and nationwide information. 

Immigrants and U.S. residents have been rounded up and despatched into oblivion, whereas Texas lawmakers focused the state’s transgender residents for merely current. Regionally, San Antonio taxpayers are on the hook for one more publicly financed stadium, whereas the brand new mayor continues to wrestle to construct a consensus on the dais. 

If there’s one phrase to precisely describe politics in 2025, it’s “turmoil.”

However even within the darkest of occasions, there are glimmers of hope. President Trump and Texas’ Republican management tried to rig the 2026 midterms, however even when the redrawn districts are held up by the courts, the 5 further Republican seats in Congress they hoped for aren’t a given.

And though rich out-of-town builders try to push by way of a controversial housing improvement in far Northwest Bexar County, residents have organized and aren’t giving up.

Right here’s a take a look at the ten largest tales affecting San Antonio this 12 months. 

1. Venture Marvel and the Spurs’ new stadium

Bored with listening to about this one but? For the second consecutive 12 months, huge (and imprecise) downtown improvement Venture Marvel dominated San Antonio headlines. Protection main as much as the November election on whether or not to publicly finance a brand new downtown enviornment for the Spurs, as a part of the broader Venture Marvel sports activities and leisure district imaginative and prescient, reached a fever pitch. Prepare: the story is more likely to dominate protection subsequent 12 months as effectively. Though financing for the NBA enviornment is in place, there’s nonetheless loads of work to be accomplished, possible together with an infrastructure bond package deal vote within the spring, and the Alamodome and Conference Heart expansions, which metropolis officers beforehand stated are amongst their high priorities.

2. New Mayor and new Metropolis Corridor squabbles

San Antonio elected a brand new mayor this summer season, and the turbulence didn’t finish together with her swearing-in. San Antonio residents whittled down an inventory of 27 potential candidates, leading to a runoff between progressive Gina Ortiz Jones, a former Below Secretary of the Air Power and Rolando Pablos, a conservative hand-picked by Gov. Greg Abbott. With a second Trump presidency looming giant, the individuals selected Jones. Regardless of presiding over a largely progressive council, the Metropolis Corridor outsider’s had a tough time constructing consensus, whether or not it’s on approving the time period sheet a few new Spurs enviornment or constructing settlement on an anti-pet dumping ordinance. Nonetheless, with a late-year vote to maneuver town’s municipal elections constructing public help, it seems Jones and metropolis council could possibly be turning the web page and changing into extra cooperative.​

3. San Antonio and Hill Nation Floods

Local weather change has penalties, as made obvious by a summer season full of tragedy from Central and South Texas flooding. Certainly, 13 individuals died on San Antonio’s Northeast facet in June when automobiles have been swept away throughout a flash flood at Beitel Creek. Weeks later, one other 135 individuals — lots of them youngsters at summer season camp — drowned when the waters of the Guadalupe River rose with out warning. Politicians from each side pointed fingers whereas dad and mom deliberate funerals. South and Central Texans are not any strangers to flash floods, however as these occasions change into extra frequent, there’s rising consensus that lawmakers ought to acknowledge actuality, cease enjoying the blame sport and begin taking motion to stop additional tragedies.

​4. Faculty Vouchers

After years of attempting, Gov. Greg Abbott and his allies lastly managed to pressure college vouchers down Texas voters’ throats in the latest legislative session. When purposes launch subsequent spring, some 100,000 Texas households will obtain $10,000 taxpayer-funded stipends to ship their youngsters to personal colleges of their alternative. Supporters argue the transfer permits youngsters in failing college districts to get a greater schooling. Nonetheless, opponents — together with a variety of schooling consultants — preserve the enterprise will solely increase college tuition and pressure the state to fund parallel college techniques, which begs the query: Wouldn’t or not it’s simpler to offer current public college districts extra funding?

5. Bexar County voter registration backlog 

The Bexar County Elections Division had its share of drama this 12 months, most notably a backlog of 53,000 unprocessed voter registrations that piled up the November election. A part of the holdup was a tough transition to a brand new voter registration processing system. The prior system’s vendor went out of enterprise in August, that means county officers knew they would want to discover a substitute. Nonetheless, commissioners hemmed and hawed concerning the spending cash, ensuing a setback to the timeline. The stopgap resolution was to affix the Texas Secretary of State’s system, despite the fact that Elections Administrator Michele Carew admitted it wasn’t outfitted to deal with a metropolis as giant as San Antonio. The system struggled to import the county’s 2 million information. In a scramble to fulfill the deadline for October early voting, the division employed on dozens of temp staffers and labored lengthy hours and weekends. 

6. Guajolote Ranch Improvement

A controversial improvement by Florida-based homebuilder Lennar in far Northwest Bexar County continued to seize native headlines this 12 months. In October, the Texas Fee on Environmental High quality (TCEQ) permitted a allow permitting the corporate to construct a handled wastewater discharge station on the delicate Helotes Creek watershed. Opponents level to a 2020 Southwest Analysis Institute research, which discovered that such a discharge station might injury the standard of water within the Edwards Aquifer, and have since filed an enchantment with the TCEQ. Additional complicating issues is Lennar’s petition for a Municipal Utility District on the 2,900-home improvement, that means native residents might be compelled to pay for the undesirable wastewater station if Lennar’s petition is permitted. A particular listening to on the matter is scheduled for Jan. 16.

7. ‘Toilet invoice’ and Texas’ punishment of trans residents

Texas Republican lawmakers continued to go laws stripping rights and dignity away from the state’s transgender residents this 12 months. Among the many most outstanding of these measures is Senate Invoice 8, the “lavatory invoice.” Also referred to as the Texas Girls’s Privateness Act, the regulation requires individuals use restroom in public buildings that align with their intercourse assigned at delivery — as if the state doesn’t have larger issues to sort out. Cities and state workplaces discovered violating the regulation could be fined as much as $125,000. That regulation additionally comes a 12 months after Texas made it practically not possible to alter your gender in your state-issued driver’s license. Opponents fear the ID change might hinder the rights of trans individuals to vote and have interaction in different actions. 

8. Intensifying immigration raids

Trump made good on his promise to step up mass deportations, and the chaos and cruelty has spilled into San Antonio. Immigration and Customs Enforcement brokers confirmed as much as immigration hearings in San Antonio, whisking these asylum seekers attempting to enter the nation “the proper method.” In the meantime, a November raid on what feds referred to as an after-hours membership on town’s North Aspect has left extra questions unanswered, together with the names of these detained and what occurred to them. The Present additionally reported on grim circumstances at South Texas holding services, the place detainees are reportedly preventing over water whereas missing fundamental healthcare and requirements. The administration denies the allegations, whereas DHS points canned statements, typically peppered with questionable claims about it focusing on the “worst of the worst.”​

9. Texas Measles Outbreak

Because it seems, so-called “healthcare freedom” and vaccine skepticism can result in outbreaks of illnesses that had largely been eradicated. Texas was floor zero for the worst measles outbreak in 35 years, leading to 762 confirmed circumstances, 99 hospitalizations and two deaths. The overwhelming majority of these sickened had both not been vaccinated or acquired each requires pictures. In the meantime, Trump Well being and Human Companies Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a outstanding anti-vaxxer, unfold false claims on-line concerning the incident. Though the outbreak is now formally over, many are anxious measles or different extremely contagious illnesses could change into a fixture of life within the Lone Star State. Is it 2026, or 1906?

10. Texas redistricting

Along with his approval numbers plummeting and consultants predicting a midterm massacre for Republicans, Trump this summer season demanded Gov. Greg Abbott redraw Texas’ congressional maps to favor the GOP. The result went about in addition to one would possibly count on. Democrat lawmakers fled the state in a bid to halt the vote, as they’ve prior to now. However there was solely so lengthy they might delay the inevitable. Though Abbott and Trump bought their new map, the matter is anticipated to proceed to be challenged within the courts all through 2026. What’s extra, whoever drew the maps could have miscalculated Latino help for Trump, which is waning for apparent causes.

Digital Content material Editor Stephanie Koithan contributed to this report.

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