El Norte Junco worked in the newsroom and occupied different management positions at
El Norte, a Monterrey newspaper founded in 1938 by his grandfather. When he became publisher of
El Norte in 1973, Junco teamed with Mary Gardner—one of his former journalism professors at the University of Texas—to train reporters in journalistic techniques and ethics. Shortly after Junco took over the leadership of
El Norte, the newspaper found itself at odds with the Mexican government after its reporting and editorials angered President
Luis Echeverria. The government attempted to shut down the newspaper by ordering PIPSA, Mexico's state-owned paper manufacturer, to stop selling newsprint to
El Norte in what would come to be known as la "Guerra del Papel" (the "Paper War"). Despite the challenges, Junco and his team were able to keep
El Norte in print by cutting the newspaper to 12 pages. Eventually, they were able to supplement their paper supply with imported newsprint. (In 1998, PIPSA was privatized by the Mexican government, allowing for the unrestricted import of newsprint.)
Grupo Reforma With his success at
El Norte and
El Sol (another Monterrey newspaper founded by his grandfather in 1922), Junco was able to expand these two newspapers into a national chain and grow his team from 17 local reporters to 400 nationwide. In November 1993, Junco launched
Reforma in Mexico City. At this point, he brought
El Norte,
El Sol,
Metro, and
Reforma together under a single publishing company, which he named
Grupo Reforma. Junco believed that commercial success through selling newspapers and advertising was a fundamental aspect to establishing a free press. To this end, he began offering food and fashion sections in
Reforma and the newspaper became popular among the middle class. And
MIT professor Chapell Lawson has said that Junco's work "changed the rules of Mexican journalism." The
freedom-of-information legislation gave journalists, investigators, and ordinary citizens access to government information that had been denied to them for decades. Junco was also part of a campaign against government
censorship throughout the early 2000s. He publicly denounced defamation charges that government officials (such as former Mexico City mayor
Rosario Robles) had levied against him and his reporters. His efforts persuaded legislators to decriminalize the expression of ideas. Grupo Reforma's news coverage and active participation through organized forums eventually persuaded Mexican legislators to approve a
2008 judicial reform that instituted public trials and put greater emphasis on due process rights.
Exposing drug-related crime In 2006, President
Felipe Calderón declared war on
drug-trafficking and
organized crime. The result was an escalating drug war that put many journalists in the crosshairs of criminal organizations. Junco and Grupo Reforma quickly found themselves at odds with the
cartels. In 2008, as violence was escalating, Junco moved his family to
Austin, Texas, to keep them safe. while he commuted to Monterrey to continue leading the company. Between 2010 and 2012, five
El Norte offices in Monterrey were attacked with grenades, bombs, and gunfire. Despite the threats and the violence, Junco continued to publish articles exposing criminal activity. He often did so without reporters' bylines in order to ensure their safety. In a 2009 interview with
Terry Gross, Junco stated, "We have every reason in the world to drop the stories, and we have every reason to look the other way, but we have resolved to continue to report all we know about the problem and continue to ask questions. And we hold to the faith that if we ask enough of them, we may finally come upon a solution." ==Awards==