CPJ files declaration in support of detained journalist Mario Guevara
Washington, D.C., August 21, 2025—The Committee to Protect Journalists filed a declaration of support on August 20, 2025, in the case of reporter Mario Guevara, as part of the American Civil Liberties Union’s habeas petition that demands U.S. federal authorities provide justification for Guevara’s ongoing detention.
In the declaration, CPJ expressed alarm that Guevara remains in detention because of his journalism.
“We are deeply concerned by the ongoing detention of journalist Mario Guevara,” said CPJ Regional Director Jose Zamora. “It is imperative that immigration authorities fully explain why he is still in detention. Keeping Guevara behind bars effectively ends the journalist’s ability to report the news and sends a chilling message to others who want to exercise their right to share information, including recorded images, about what officials do in public.”
Local authorities in Atlanta, Georgia, initially detained Guevara, an award-winning Atlanta-based reporter, on June 14 while he was livestreaming a “No Kings” protest against the actions of the Trump administration.
The journalist was subsequently transferred between local authorities and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention, and remains in ICE detention at Georgia’s Folkston ICE Processing Center, though he has no charges against him and was in the country legally at the time of his arrest.
A legal team, including the American Civil Liberties Union; the ACLU of Georgia; the University of Georgia School of Law’s First Amendment Clinic; Garland, Samuel & Loeb, P.C.; and Diaz and Gaeta Law, LLC, filed the habeas petition in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Georgia. The petition argued that Guevara’s continued detention is retaliatory and violates due process as well as the First and Fifth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution.