‘Tráileres, trampa para migrantes’ (‘Cargo trucks: a trap for migrants’) is a seven-month investigation that reveals the scale of a dangerous human smuggling trade through Mexico, using overcrowded trucks to carry migrants in precarious and dangerous conditions from Central America to the United States.
This cross-border reporting collaboration was led by Noticias Telemundo and the Latin American Center for Investigative Journalism (CLIP), with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), Bellingcat and local media outlets Pie de Página, Chiapas Paralelo and En un 2×3 Tamaulipas, in Mexico, Plaza Pública in Guatemala and Contracorriente in Honduras.
In 2023, while covering the death of 53 migrants who were trapped in a cargo truck in San Antonio, Texas, Telemundo journalists put a call-out in their stories and social media platforms asking immigrants who had traveled in similar conditions to share their experience. The reporters received dramatic testimonials of people who said they had survived days-long trips across Mexico crammed in cargo vehicles with little ventilation. The journalists realized they had an important, previously untold story in front of them: the smuggling of migrants in trucks across Mexico to reach the U.S. border was more common and the conditions were far worse than the cases they had documented within the U.S.
Given the transnationality of the topic and the need for hyperlocal reporting in Mexico and the countries of origin of most migrants who cross the Mexican territory, Telemundo reporter Ronny Rojas approached colleagues in other countries to collaborate.
CLIP assembled a team of reporters, animators, illustrators and social media specialists to tell the stories in engaging formats, showcasing the voices of victims and stakeholders.
Telemundo interviewed victims in the U.S. who recalled the inhumane conditions in which they traveled. The outlet produced a 40-minute documentary along with a multimedia special report.
ICIJ helped fact-check the database that Telemundo and CLIP compiled by reviewing media coverage and official reports of accidents or incidents involving trucks and migrants. The database documented for the first time nearly 19,000 migrants’ journeys and at least 111 deaths, with hundreds more injured. The team published the downloadable database and methodology to promote transparency and share the information with others.
In Europe, Bellingcat, a nonprofit specializing in open-source intelligence techniques, tracked smugglers offering their services on social media, and geolocated key sites in the stories.
Partners in Mexico helped file dozens of public records requests and interview government officials and advocates. Reporter Martha Olivia López spent weeks approaching people in the trucking industry, until she got a revelatory interview with a driver who said he has transported migrants hidden in cargo trucks and described how the smuggling operations work.
Reporters from Plaza Pública, Contracorriente and ICIJ visited small towns in Guatemala, Honduras and the Dominican Republic to interview migrants who had taken the risky journeys only to be deported back to their countries, as well as the relatives of people who died of asphyxiation inside trucks or in accidents.
This is an incredible collaboration, focusing on the best of each partner’s skills to create a powerful, overarching narrative with so much detail that it could not be ignored. Even stronger is that its focus is people who are so often forgotten and ignored — this is collaborative journalism at its most impressive and necessary.
