CMIA at the Festival Gabo 2025: A Shared Commitment to Ethical Journalism

Since our founding three years ago, the Center for Media Integrity of the Americas (CMIA) has been proud to count among its partners the Gabriel Garcia Marquez Foundation. (FundaGabo), Latin America’s preeminent organization that supports high-quality, ethical journalism in the spirit of its founder, Colombian journalist and Nobel Prize author, Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

As in past years, CMIA was present at the annual Festival Gabo 2025, which celebrated 30 years of FundaGabo’s commitment to storytelling and freedom of expression. Held from July 24 to 27, in Bogotá, Colombia, the festival brought together journalists, novelists, researchers and other multimedia content creators, along with thought leaders from across the Americas. The festival environment provided a conducive space for dialogue and collaboration. For the CMIA, it was an opportunity to engage with and support a community deeply aligned with its mission to strengthen independent, ethical, high-quality journalism across the hemisphere.

A highlight of CMIA’s involvement was a panel discussion titled “Spanglish stories en la era Trump”. CMIA’s Executive Director, John Feeley, took part alongside bilingual journalism experts from the City University of New York in a dynamic exploration of storytelling at the intersection of English and Spanish-language media.

In addition to its public events, CMIA hosted a closed-door session titled “Press Under Pressure,” which focused on the growing challenges faced by U.S. journalists in today’s polarized political climate. The session created a rare space for open, candid discussion—where Latin American journalists shared their own experiences and collective “muscle memory” developed working under government censorship, threats, harassment and open judicial persecution, as are now occurring in the United States. Their insights and advice offered valuable lessons in resilience, adaptability, and courage, highlighting the importance of global solidarity in defending press freedom.

In addition to FundaGabo’s director Jaime Abello, other CMIA Board of Advisor colleagues participating at this year’s festival included Luz Mely Reyes, María Jimena Duzán, Jon Lee Anderson, and Natalia Viana. Former CMIA Journalism Seminar participants Ivan Reyes, and Adriana Diaz were also present.

We congratulate our friends and partners at the Fundación Gabo for their unbreakable commitment to our shared journalistic values —truth, rigor, creativity, and journalism as public service in a democratic society.