Detention of reporter Mario Guevara hits Atlanta’s Hispanic community: 'Nobody does what he does'

For years, Arturo depended on Mario Guevara. The Gwinnett County resident, who asked for his real name not be shared, has met Mario, a prominent Spanish-language journalist in the Atlanta area, only once, running into him at a Home Depot. “He is very tall,” Arturo said. But Mario had been a constant presence in Arturo’s life as he navigated Atlanta.

Multiple times a day, Mario would broadcast videos on Facebook that Arturo monitored as he drove his pickup truck around the suburbs, moving from site to site for landscaping or construction jobs. Most of Mario’s reports were about sightings of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE); some were about crime or missing people; and there were always food reviews — Mario at a strip-mall restaurant off Jimmy Carter Boulevard, chowing down on tacos or tamales while he grinned for a photo. 

Tuning in to those reports, Arturo said, he felt he had some sense of what was going on around him. But now Arturo says he feels like he’s at a loss. As he drives around the metro without a license, he has no clue where ICE is.