Mario Guevara spent the bulk of his days as a journalist in constant movement, trawling through Hispanic enclaves throughout metro Atlanta to document immigration arrests and their emotional aftermath. Hundreds of thousands of Spanish-language users on social media tuned in to his coverage of Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations.

Now, Guevara finds himself in stasis, locked in solitary confinement in the bowels of the sprawling ICE detention network and facing deportation to El Salvador.

To pass the time in his windowless cell, Guevara paces, sings and reads his Bible. He said he is allowed out for only two hours per day.

“I’m emotionally destroyed,” he told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution from the Folkston ICE Processing Center, an immigration detention facility near the Florida border.

The reporter’s time in ICE custody recently crossed the one-month mark.

“I’m plainly convinced that my situation in this ICE jail is direct retaliation for my coverage,” Guevara said. “I haven’t committed any crimes.

“The government wants to use me as an example, they want to send a message that people can’t be following ICE operatives or expose what’s happening.”

ICE did not respond to a request for comment about Guevara’s statements. On X, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said Guevara “is in ICE custody because he is in our country ILLEGALLY.”

Although Guevara lacks permanent legal status, he has a valid work permit and a path to a green card through his U.S. citizen son, his attorneys have said.

Police tell Spanish-language reporter Mario Guevara to move back during a protest on ICE raids and deportation arrests on Chamblee Tucker Road on June 14. (Arvin Temkar/AJC)

Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC

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Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC

In the wake of Guevara’s June 14 arrest while livestreaming a tense anti-ICE protest in DeKalb County — the precipitating event in Guevara’s current deportation fight — the reporter and his legal team notched several wins.

Three DeKalb misdemeanor charges filed against him over his behavior at the protest were dropped. Additional misdemeanor charges filed in Gwinnett County over alleged traffic infractions were also dropped. And on July 1, a federal immigration judge ruled that Guevara could be released from ICE custody on a $7,500 bond.

But ICE appealed the judge’s decision, triggering a stay on Guevara’s bond order.

Giovanni Diaz, one of Guevara’s attorneys, said government attorneys argued during the reporter’s bond hearing that Guevara’s livestreams impeded law enforcement agents’ ability to do their work.

“They want to keep him detained, and they’re willing to pull out all the stops to keep him detained,” he said.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, an international nonprofit that defends the rights of journalists, Guevara is the only reporter in ICE detention nationwide.

As difficult as Guevara is finding his time in Folkston, a facility that is set to become the largest immigrant detention center in the U.S., he told the AJC that being held in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary was worse.

In January, the Trump administration began using that prison to hold ICE detainees. Guevara spent two days there earlier this month, between stints at Folkston.

According to Guevara, ICE detainees at the federal penitentiary spend most of the day mixed with the prison’s nonimmigrant inmates, all of whom are criminal convicts. In contrast, nearly half the people in ICE detention have no criminal record.

Guevara said a nonimmigrant inmate extorted him, requiring wire transfers from his family to keep him safe. ICE did not respond to a question about Guevara’s characterization of his time in the federal penitentiary.

Among Guevara’s fellow immigrant detainees from Latin America, the treatment has been warmer. He said people come up to him to share words of encouragement.

“Everyone here knows me,” he said. “One person even told me that I recorded his arrest. Imagine that.”

As ICE ramps up enforcement to meet higher arrest quotas, Guevara knows he is missed in the community based on social media comments his loved ones have read to him.

“People are realizing that they have to be informed when there are raids happening on a daily basis,” he said. “It fills me with joy to know that my work had an impact. But I’m paying for that with my freedom.

“It’s a high price.”

Should he be released from detention, Guevara said he would stop documenting immigration enforcement operations.

“I can’t put myself at risk,” he said. “Unless I become a U.S. citizen, my coverage will have to change.”

“It fills me with joy to know that my work had an impact. But I’m paying for that with my freedom," journalist Mario Guevara said. (Miguel Martinez/AJC)

Credit: Miguel Martinez

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Credit: Miguel Martinez

Changing political views

Guevara said he feels let down by a political party with which he once identified — the GOP.

“I feel like I have always had an ideology that leaned toward the Republican Party because of my principles and my Christian values,” Guevara said. “But now I’m so disappointed knowing that those Christian morals I thought they had, they’ve turned into racial hatred.”

Guevara said Donald Trump didn’t strike him as someone to fear leading up to the 2024 election. He is not alone. According to a June 2025 Pew Research Center analysis of election results, Trump won a majority of Hispanic men, and came close to winning the overall Latino vote.

“I was confident that Trump was a smart man who could help in terms of the economy of the country, and that he could help give a boost to moral values in the U.S. … but when he got into power, I realized that his ideology was completely different. It was simply persecution, persecution, persecution,” he said.

“I can’t vote, obviously, but if someone voted for him, they should consider what he has done and what he continues to do against our community. Next time, we need to vote in a wiser way, unless we want to keep being persecuted.”

Looking back, Guevara said he regrets risking time with his wife and three children, ages 27, 21 and 14, by coming into frequent contact with law enforcement through his immigration reporting.

“That may have been the biggest mistake of my life, because now I’m realizing that work is not more important than family,” he said. “But I am no criminal.

“My family needs me. I’m going to fight until the end.”

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