Case Study

How funders can support Hispanic newsrooms in authentic ways

By Mark Glaser

July 2, 2026

This post is part of “Building a Thriving News Ecosystem,” a series from Knight Communities Network, a Lenfest Institute community of practice for local funders creating thriving news ecosystems.

During recent ICE immigration raids in cities such as Minneapolis and Chicago, local newsrooms came together to cover the crises, especially in affected Hispanic communities — and funders moved quickly to help. Press Forward Minnesota deployed $700,000, including $200,000 from Knight Foundation, to support local news organizations in Minneapolis. Press Forward Chicago helped rally more than $900,000 in grants to support 14 outlets, from Borderless Magazine to Lumpen Radio, while funding an immigration coverage hub at Chicago Public Media. 

Information access has never been more critical for Hispanic communities, and many news funders would like to support them. But how can they better understand the news outlets in these communities and their needs? And how can they do it in an authentic, culturally sensitive way? Effective funding must be rooted in research, listening, trust, and customized support rather than one-size-fits-all programs.

Before getting started, it’s important to have some important context:

• There’s incredible diversity in the market of Hispanic media and Hispanic communities. Local TV has been important, and WhatsApp and Facebook are used extensively. A third-generation Mayan immigrant is different from a first-generation Venezuelan immigrant.

• Don’t just prioritize Spanish-language news, as the majority of Hispanic adults get news in English, according to Pew Research Center (see chart above). Consider supporting publishers that deliver news in English, Spanish, and both.
• Hispanic media has been historically underfunded and under-represented in the industry. Most funders and media leaders have considered the market as niche or secondary when it’s actually growing in power.
• Hispanic communities are facing a crisis, so support must come quickly and without barriers. Philanthropy now has to “move at the speed of news” as Knight President and CEO Maribel Pérez Wadsworth likes to say.

Julio Ricardo Varela, a veteran journalist who runs The Latino Newsletter, says funders need to educate themselves about the market first. “Stop painting us with a broad brush,” he said. “We’re not a monolith. And stop looking at us as a separate part of this country — we’re integral to this country. Latino voters are American voters.”

Here are some important guiding principles in funding Hispanic media so they can continue to serve their communities for years to come.

1. Do your research to understand the landscape, but don’t get stuck.

Research has been spotty and often outdated when it comes to Hispanic and Latino media in the U.S. While “The State of Local News” report is published annually by Medill, “The State of The Latino News Media” was last published by CUNY’s Latino Media Initiative in 2019 (see image above). While there’s much to be done at the national level, some local markets are making progress. Press Forward South Florida recently produced a local news landscape study and news outlet database, including a filter for Spanish language outlets.

With Miami as a hub, it’s not surprising that there are 22 Spanish-language outlets there. But Tere Figueras Negrete, senior director of Press Forward South Florida, says it can be surprising to see a news desert even in an urban area. Most cities and neighborhoods lack the regular coverage they had a decade ago, leaving people to get information from social media, word-of-mouth, and other sources.

“One of the things that we realized is that people aren’t experiencing a lack of information — they’re experiencing a lack of useful information,” she said. “So we’re a very noisy, fragmented, disjointed media environment. People are cobbling together their own information networks, but how much of it is actually verified, trusted information? And if you speak a different language, you’re even more reliant on these increasingly fragile sources of information.”

Despite the gaps in research, funders shouldn’t get stuck doing too much analysis, also known as “paralysis by analysis.” Lucy Flores, co-founder and president of the Latino Media Consortium and co-founder of Luz Media, says that research is necessary to help guide smart investment in Hispanic media, but that urgent action is needed too.

“If funders want to understand the problem and help solve the problem, then they have to start by funding the necessary research,” Flores said. “But sometimes funders get in this mindset that they will keep researching and researching, but at some point you’ve got to stop and actually do the work.”

Altavoz Lab environmental fellow Alejandra Martinez (right) handed out fliers with her report for the Texas Tribune to people in the community at laundromats (Photo via her post on X)

2. Listen to community-rooted newsrooms and the people they serve to better tailor solutions. 

Valeria Fernández is the founder and executive director of Altavoz Lab, a nonprofit that  invests in community-rooted journalists through fellowships and newsroom partnerships, and it’s expanding into residencies designed to strengthen long-term career pathways. In one case, environmental fellows Alejandra Martinez and Wendy Selene Pérez co-wrote a story for the Texas Tribune about air pollution in Cloverleaf, Texas, and then followed up by giving out fliers and postcards to educate the community (see photo above).

Fernández believes that the best funding approaches start with listening, humility and partnership — not assumptions. She says that funders should learn from journalists and communities instead of dictating to them. “We are not trying to make everybody fit into a mold — we’re trying to really meet them where they’re at,” she said. “You have to listen, understand what they’re doing, and support them in a way that actually fits their reality.”

Claudia Amaro was also a fellow with the Reynolds Journalism Institute and her project involved creating a resource for journalists called CoveringImmigration.com

Claudia Amaro runs the Planeta Venus news outlet and radio show in Wichita to serve Hispanic communities in Kansas. She agrees that listening is key for funders, and convening more people through stakeholder meetings and focus groups. Importantly, she says to avoid assumptions about what communities need.

“The listening part is very important in our communities, because you don’t know what you don’t know,” Amaro said. “There’s often a stigma that they put on Latino communities, where they put us all in one bucket. But when foundations start listening to different people, different newsrooms, it really enriches them.”

3. Uplift the smaller players who aren’t the most obvious.

Funders tend to gravitate to innovative projects and people who have already received funding, leading to increased media attention and conference appearances. But there are so many less prominent, community-oriented newsrooms that are doing difficult work. Amaro notes that many of these outlets are under-resourced and excluded because they can’t afford memberships in larger associations or to travel to conferences. 

“We see that over and over, where the funding community finds one champion and that champion is getting all the grants,” Amaro said. “And they go to every conference, they are the main speaker, and we all feel like that’s good because they are opening doors for us, but that help is not reaching all of us.”

Varela of The Latino Newsletter, who founded Latino Rebels and previously worked at Futuro Media, believes that many smaller players are being overlooked and overshadowed by corporate media such as Univision and Telemundo. 

“Not everything needs to be scalable for local newsrooms,” Varela said. “I actually argue that funders should cover all their bases and spread their bets a little bit more. I hate to use a gambling metaphor but it’s like a roulette table. Put a little bit on each number, as opposed to always going with red or black.” He emphasizes that small newsrooms can do more with less and build trust in communities.

Lucy Flores speaks at an event in Los Angeles to introduce the Latino Media Consortium’s board and programs (Photo via LMC’s Instagram)

4. Support organizations and intermediaries can help provide an on-ramp for funding.

One easy way for funders to get started supporting Hispanic media is by partnering with established intermediaries who already know the landscape and how best to uplift newsrooms. Flores of the Latino Media Consortium says it’s important to count on groups that are solution-oriented and have people with lived experience serving Hispanic and Latino communities.

“The Consortium is entirely led by and developed by practitioners,” she said. “Every last one of us has been in the trenches. We’ve experienced the day-to-day challenges of serving our community and figuring out how to pay for it, how to grow, how to reach 65 million Latinos. Your best solution is going to be found in the people that are closest to the problem.”

A helpful intermediary can centralize knowledge and credibility, making it easier for funders to work in concert and making sure that support is aligned with newsrooms’ needs. The North Carolina Local News Lab Fund has a track record of supporting Hispanic newsrooms and community organizations that make a difference across the state. The Fund’s director Lizzy Hazeltine says intermediaries can help bring on-the-ground expertise.

“Intermediaries with local knowledge and expertise provide critical on-ramps to this kind of grantmaking,” she said. “It’s one role of the Fund to explore and make sense of some of these complexities and the opportunities funders have to invest in serving all communities, including Hispanic communities from farmworkers to third culture youth to families, elders and everyone in between.”

Final takeaways & next steps

• Invest in long-term relationships, trust, and capacity. Amaro at Planeta Venus said she appreciated the way Wichita Foundation, a major funder for the news outlet, was willing to invest in their relationship, listen, and create trust. “They truly care about the community and understand the importance of communications in philanthropy,” she said. The Foundation supported capacity-building, such as travel to conferences and training, while also trusting Amaro to experiment with a print newspaper, which has been a big success.

• Don’t just focus on Spanish-language media and translations. As noted above, Hispanic audiences mix their media consumption between Spanish and English. “Reducing Hispanic media to expanding language access misses a deeper opportunity and a more complex reality,” Hazeltine said. “Other kinds of media grantmaking apply a similar nuance about fit between an organization’s approach and their specific audience’s needs, habits and preferences.” Make sure that your local news ecosystem research covers language and news platform preferences, which vary widely.

• Lower barriers for grants and be cognizant of people’s time. One of the precepts of trust-based philanthropy is trying to work more in partnership with grantees, something especially critical for Hispanic media outlets that are often stretched for time and resources. “Respect people’s time,” said Fernández of Altavoz Lab. “Understand that if you put high barriers in complicated application systems, that might be the end of the story — they might not be able to apply. Their time is precious.” Consider that smaller newsrooms might not have dedicated grant writers.

• When measuring success, focus on real community impact. Especially with smaller news outlets, it doesn’t make sense for funders to expect big growth metrics. Instead, think about the way these publishers make a difference in their community. “This is not about the clicks, this is about who is in the room,” said Fernández. “The quality of the conversation. When you’re able to convene the fire marshal, the local neighborhood organizer, activists, and a bunch of neighbors all coming together to talk about what matters — that’s impact.”

Resources

If you’re interested in learning more about supporting Hispanic media, check out these research reports, stories and guides:

• Key facts about U.S. Latinos from Pew Research Center
• Americans’ Social Media Use 2025 from Pew Research Center
• Assessment & Capacity-Building Program Dashboard from the Latino Media Consortium, assessing newsrooms and matching them with digital media experts
• Press Forward South Florida News and Information Database
• How Claudia Amaro and Planeta Venus empower Latino communities in Wichita at Altavoz Lab
• The Political Economy of Covering ICE (with a focus on Los Angeles) at The Latinx Project
• Safety Tips for Journalists Covering Protests at the National Association of Hispanic Journalists
• Creator Safety Guide for Documenting Demonstrations at News Creator Corps