Tim Padgett
Americas EditorTim Padgett is the Americas Editor for WLRN, covering Latin America, the Caribbean and their key relationship with South Florida.
Padgett has reported on Latin America for more than 30 years — including for Newsweek as its Mexico City bureau chief and for Time as its Latin America and Miami bureau chief — from the end of Central America's civil wars to the normalization of U.S.-Cuba relations. He has interviewed more than 20 heads of state.
In 2005, Padgett received Columbia University’s Maria Moors Cabot Prize for his body of work in Latin America. In 2016 he won a national Edward R. Murrow award for the radio series "The Migration Maze," about the brutal causes of — and potential solutions to — Central American migration.
Padgett is an Indiana native and a graduate of Wabash College. He received a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University's Medill School and studied in Caracas, Venezuela, at the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello. He has been an adult literacy volunteer and is a member of the Catholic poverty aid organization St. Vincent de Paul.
Contact Tim at tpadgett@wlrnnews.org
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COMMENTARY Draconian sentences meted out under Cuba's cyber-sedition laws should beckon support for more subtle, private sector subversion — including video games.
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Latin America's economy is still struggling to recover from the pandemic — and China's trade and investment presence is on the rise there. But the U. S. is looking to ramp up its economic partnership with the region, as President Biden's point man Jose Fernandez tells WLRN.
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COMMENTARY The Venezuelan regime's lame claim that investigative journalists took part in an epic corruption scheme likely portends plans to steal the July 28 election.
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Panama's right-wing president-elect, José Raúl Mulino, has pledged to block the Darién jungle passage — a route many Venezuelan migrants use today en route to South Florida.
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COMMENTARY By equating Israel's admittedly brutal counter-offensive in Gaza with genuine genocide like Guatemala's, protesters risk rendering genocide itself less meaningful.
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Survivors of Guatemalan military massacres have brought former army general Benedicto Lucas García to trial for genocide — and many, after fleeing threats, are now part of Lake Worth Beach's large Maya community.
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Another American has been arrested in the Turks and Caicos for bringing ammunition into the islands — a reminder the Caribbean is lashing back at its gun-trafficking surge, most of which law enforcement say can be traced back to South Florida.
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COMMENTARY When U.S. officials, Republican or Democrat, honor only Latin American journalism that promotes their political agendas in the region, it spoils U.S. credibility in that region.
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The former diplomat is the Venezuelan opposition's new candidate against Nicolás Maduro. Venezuelan exiles feel cautiously optimistic about his chances. “He’s a very level-headed person — a consensus-builder," said one expat who worked closely with him in government.
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Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro’s regime is growing “more fierce” in protecting its power and the decade-long exodus of Venezuelans leaving the country will likely intensify following upcoming July 28 elections, says Beatriz Olavarria, a longtime Venezuelan exile activist in South Florida.
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COMMENTARY The Biden Administration has decided to re-impose U.S. oil sanctions on Venezuela — but either way, it looks like the dictatorship will have its way for now.
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The famed civil rights attorney said the police-involved shooting last month of Donald Armstrong is yet another disturbing instance when police officers fail to handle mental health-related emergency calls and routinely impose criminal charges to justify using lethal force