The 10 most-read news stories 2025: ICE raids, misconduct and porn

Man, 2025 was a sumumabitch, wasn’t it?

We wouldn’t blame you if you wanted to throw this year in the trash. It was the year of ICE raids and of Donald Trump’s single-minded and haphazard plan to aggrandize himself at the expense of regular people. It was a year when things got more expensive (cough cough, TARIFFS) and when life seemed to get a little (or a lot) worse. Frankly, we should just hit the skids on advancing fully into 2026 until we can figure out what the hell is going on.

Time does work that way, alas, so next year beckons. But before we get there, we wanted to highlight the stories that really resonated with you, the readers of Phoenix New Times. Prepare a strong drink — some of these stories might anger you. Some, we hope, made you smile. Which ones do which may say a lot about you.

Here are our most-read news stories of 2025.

10. ICE raids hit Valley businesses and neighborhoods

Perhaps because the state went for him in 2024, Trump hasn’t treated Arizona like he has Los Angeles, Chicago and North Carolina and other Democratic-run states and cities that have felt the brunt of the president’s brutal immigration crackdown. But that doesn’t mean the Valley has been spared Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids. In June, New Times reported on rumors of raids in the Valley that quickly proved to be true, and our reporters criss-crossed the Phoenix area to follow ICE caravans in real time.

9. The Big Takeover: The secret plans to give Trump command of America’s police

Earlier this year, New Times received a grant to fund watchdog reporting on the state and the border. The first piece we produced with that grant was quite the scoop. Reporter Beau Hodai uncovered previously unreported planning documents from a subgroup of the infamous Project 2025 effort to reshape the country in Trump’s image. The documents — created by the “Border Security Work Group,” a collective filled with Trump-adjacent law enforcement leaders, military veterans, national security types and more — laid out a drastic restructuring of American policing to place it firmly under the president’s thumb. The story proved prophetic, as a lot of those plans have since come to pass. Keep an eye out in 2026: There’ll be more to report from these documents.

8. Arizona ranked worst state in U.S. for starting a family

This one touched a nerve among our readers. A study from Ivy Surrogacy found that Arizona is dead last among the 50 states when it comes to the best places to raise a family. According to a host of economic and education data — the rate of uninsured children (worst), vehicle fatalities per 100 million miles (third-worst) and high school graduation (third-worst) — Arizona does a poor job of teaching its kids and keeping them healthy. This story generated a ton of opinions on our social media channels, with some bemoaning Arizona’s laggard status and others defending the honor of the Grand Canyon State. We love it here, too, but we’d be lying if we said this state couldn’t do a lot more to help kids and families.

7. QAnon Shaman says he’s rightful president, sues Trump for $40 trillion

Jacob Chansley, also known as the QAnon Shaman, has had quite the character arc over the last few years. In 2021, he stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, an act that won him media coverage (thanks to his headdress and face paint) and a prison sentence. When Trump reassumed office, he pardoned Chansley along with a host of other Jan. 6 insurrectionists, leading Chansley to celebrate and say on social media that he’d now go buy some guns. Not long after, though, Chansley turned on Trump. The president had balked at releasing the Epstein files, the cause that had animated so many who stormed the Capitol on his behalf. Chansley cursed Trump’s name and, in September, sued him in a self-authored, rambling complaint that made a series of bizarre claims. The suit is destined to fail, but it offers a unique look into the mind of the conspiracy-brained types that Trump was all too happy to use to his advantage.

6. Women shouldn’t hold office, says GOP woman now running for office

If you or Alanis Morissette are curious about the proper definition of irony, this headline is a perfect example. In 2024, one of the daughters of GOP Rep. Andy Biggs popped off on a little-known podcast — everyone has one, after all — about how she wouldn’t vote for women and that women should be in the home and not public office. A year later, that daughter, Mylie Biggs, decided to run for state senate. New Times was the first to report the comments, boiling it down in the above headline that had many on social media saying, “Amazingly, this is not from The Onion.” Nope, it’s real life.

5. Here’s how much more expensive Phoenix has become since 2020

It started more than five years ago, but in many ways, we’re still feeling the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. That was evident from this story on a study that found inflation outpaced wage growth in Phoenix from December 2020 to December 2024, leading to real wages effectively declining by 3%. This struck a chord with many readers who have felt the effects of the affordability crisis without really being able to put a thumb on what exactly was happening. That unaffordability helped Trump win Arizona and regain office, though we’d bet dollars to donuts that his tariffs have made (and will continue to make) the problem worse since this study came out.

4. Pornhub has cut off Arizona over a new law. There’s a way around it

Arizona, you absolute horndogs. This fall, a new state law took effect requiring adult websites to verify someone’s identity before granting them access — essentially, you need to show ID or present a credit card to watch porn. Major sites like PornHub balked at this, cutting off Arizona-based IP addresses rather than be forced to collect sensitive information from users. New Times was here to help, though, offering up this handy guide to how to evade those restrictions by using a virtual private network, or VPN. That story has been clicked more than 68,000 times. We’re happy to have been of service.

3. Top Arizona Attorney General official arrested by postal inspectors

This bizarre saga, which is still unfolding in the courts, was first reported by New Times. In November, a top attorney under Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes was arrested by U.S. Postal Inspectors for allegedly opening and reselling mail that had been misdelivered to her home. The attorney, Vanessa Hickman, resigned ahead of her arrest, and the AG’s office released a statement that was less than supportive. Hickman is now facing felony charges, and her case might not be resolved until next year.

2. Phoenix homeowners are delisting properties en masse as market shifts

Is the housing market finally softening? Maybe. In September, we reported that Phoenix led the nation in the rate of homes being delisted, suggesting a shift in a housing market that had exploded during the pandemic. Suddenly unable to find buyers to meet their sky-high prices, sellers decided to take their houses off the market and stand pat. Another study showed that Phoenix ranked highly in price cuts on available homes. Is it a buyer’s paradise now? Have we solved the housing crisis? Far from it, but it ain’t as bad as it used to be.

1. Turning Point leader pleads guilty to attempted election fraud

We love schadenfreude, don’t we? This year, former state lawmaker and Turning Point leader Austin Smith provided plenty of it. Last year, Smith abruptly dropped his reelection bid amid allegations that he forged signatures on his petition to secure a spot on the ballot. This year, Smith was formally charged for doing so by the Attorney General’s Office, resulting in a plea deal. The news of that plea — guilty, for the record — from a guy who spouted his share of election fraud conspiracy theories took on a life of its own, with this story finding a wide readership outside Arizona. For that, we must thank the Arizona Mirror, the nonprofit newsroom that reported and wrote it. They do great work, and we’re happy to have the occasion to boost the reach of their reporting.