Mexican journalist Emilio Gutiérrez Soto has been granted asylum in the United States after 15 years of fighting for protection. Gutiérrez and his son fled Mexico in 2008 after receiving death threats over Gutiérrez’s reporting on corruption within the Mexican military in the northern state of Chihuahua.

They were detained for seven months, eventually released to live in the United States while an asylum appeal was pending. Democracy Now! spoke with Gutiérrez by phone in 2017 as he was jailed at a U.S. detention center in El Paso, Texas, awaiting possible deportation.

Emilio Gutiérrez Soto: “Well, if we are deported, that obviously implies death. Why? Because ICE, under the Department of Homeland Security of the United States, by law, must give a report to the immigration authorities of Mexico and the consulate. And the immigration officials in Mexico have no credibility. It’s impossible to trust in them. To the contrary, many of those officials, many personnel at the consulate or immigration service, are caught up with organized crime.”