Leonardo Castañeda Mercado is a border and immigration policy advocate at the ACLU of New Mexico. Prior to that, he worked in the affiliate’s Communications Department as an investigative reporter with a focus on immigration and border rights.
Before joining the ACLU of New Mexico, Leonardo worked as a reporter at The Mercury News and East Bay Times in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he covered the disparate impact of COVID-19 on communities of color, economic inequality, and the way large landowners had shaped the development of Silicon Valley. He previously worked at Inewsource, a nonprofit investigative news organization in San Diego, Calif. There, he reported on government accountability and campaign finance and was the lead data reporter on a collaborative project mapping the construction of the U.S.-Mexico border wall.
Originally from Mexico City, he grew up in San Diego and graduated from San Diego State University with degrees in journalism and economics.
You can reach Leo via e-mail at lcastaneda@aclu-nm.org.
