How do citizens in exile view news from home? What’s the point of journalism that no one is consuming? Where does news go once persecuted reporters in exile hit “publish” on their stories?

Throughout this book, as was the case at the companion symposium on the University of Oregon campus in the spring of 2024, you are brought face-to-face with the grim realities many of our counterparts face in trying to get the news—the truth—to their audiences. In this chapter, we investigate how exiled citizens curate, filter, and interpret news from their home countries. Three journalist-students (deliberate wording) shoe-leathered into the homes and workplaces of individuals, each of them from nations that exert deplorable oppresions of press freedoms, in the Oregon Willamette Valley from Portland to Eugene to find out. What warms this teacher’s heart is to see the glow that the three selected reporters felt after getting this assignment. I can assure readers that this project solidified each of their respective resolves to speak truth to power, to appreciate their freedoms, and to tell stories that need daylight.

The three contributors, Julia Boboc, Malya Fass, and Mario Ponce Martinez de la Riva, offer diverse perspectives on the experiences of migrants far from home and the role of journalism. They delve into the challenges faced by immigrants in navigating news media, the impact of biased reporting, and the importance of diverse voices in journalism.

Boboc focuses on the stories of three immigrant women—from Mexico, Chile, and Colombia—exploring their news consumption habits and their desires for more inclusive and positive representation. Fass highlights the challenges faced by journalists in exile, particularly focusing on the experiences of an Afghan journalist who fled persecution. Ponce Martinez de la Riva delves into the experiences of Hispanic immigrants in the US, examining their perceptions of news media and their own identities.