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U.S. NEWS Friday 8 March 2019

Mexican journalist seeking U.S. asylum again ordered deported

By NOMAAN MERCHANT
Associated Press
HOUSTON (AP) — A Mexican journalist has again been or-
dered deported from the United States despite his fear
that his past stories about corruption make him a target in
one of the world’s most dangerous countries for reporters.
The attorney for Emilio Gutierrez Soto and his son, Os-
car, said Thursday that he would appeal an immigration
judge’s decision denying them asylum.
Judge Robert Hough’s Feb. 28 order says Emilio Gutierrez
Soto’s testimony was not credible and that he had not
shown that he would be singled out for his reporting on
the Mexican military were he to return now.
Press freedom advocates have highlighted Gutierrez’s
articles that alleged military forces were robbing and ex-
torting local people in Chihuahua, which borders New
Mexico and part of West Texas.
He and Oscar Gutierrez Soto entered the U.S. in 2008.
Gutierrez says he was threatened for writing those articles
and fears he will be targeted if forced to return to Mexico.
Hough said that those fears were “merely speculative”
given the decade that’s passed since the articles were
published. The judge also said Mexico “has laws which
protect free speech and the government generally re-
spects these rights.”
Eight journalists were killed in Mexico last year in con-
nection with their reporting work, according to Reporters
Without Borders, more than any other country besides Af-
ghanistan.
Two journalists in Mexico have already been killed this
year.
In many parts of the country, drug cartels and organized
crime gangs are largely free to harass and murder report-
ers with impunity.
The asylum request made by Gutierrez and his son was
first denied in July 2017, and they were taken into deten- In this Jan. 30, 2009, file photo, Mexican journalist Emilio Gutierrez Soto smiles as he listens to
tion that December during a check-in with immigration attorney Carlos Spector speak during a news conference in El Paso, Texas. Associated Press
authorities. The two were released in July, two months af-
ter an immigration appeals court ordered a new asylum
hearing.
Their attorney, Eduardo Beckett, said Thursday that the
two were not under immediate threat of deportation af-
ter the order, but are under a “dark cloud ... which causes
much anxiety and stress not knowing the final result.”
“It is well documented that persons who have filed com-
plaints or have gone public against government authori-
ties have paid with their lives,” Beckett said in an email.
The National Press Club said it would mobilize in support of
the Gutierrez family.
Emilio Gutierrez is currently serving a journalism fellowship
at the University of Michigan.q