Maria Hinojosa

She’s Centering Latinx Stories with Award-Winning Journalism

When Maria Hinojosa was a little girl growing up in Harlem, she watched the evening news every night, but she never saw stories about Mexican Americans like her family. It’s why she dedicated her career to reshaping the narrative around Latinx communities in the United States. She was the first Latina journalist on NPR’s editorial team, where she launched the Peabody Award-winning Latino USA, the longest-running Latino-focused program on the radio. In 2010, she founded The Futuro Media Group, an independent, nonprofit news media organization and podcast studio, which won a Pulitzer Prize in 2022 for Suave, a seven-part series following David Luis “Suave” Gonzalez’s journey to freedom after a life sentence at age 17. In 2023, the organization was nominated for an Emmy for its work on After Uvalde: Guns, Grief, & Texas Politics. In April, Futuro announced its biggest launch yet: Futuro+, a subscription service offering extended interviews, behind-the-scenes bonus episodes, early access to new series and seasons, and exclusive members-only events for its podcasts, which reach millions of listeners.

By Audrey Goodson Kingo