María Teresa Montaño, 2023

“I dedicate this award to freedom of expression and to those journalists who do not sell themselves and who are on the right side at crucial moments.”

“I dedicate this award to freedom of expression and to those journalists who do not sell themselves and who are on the right side at crucial moments.” Mexican investigative journalist María Teresa Montaño said this in her 2023 CPJ International Press Freedom Award acceptance speech. Based in the State of Mexico, Montaño has reported on corruption, transparency, human rights, and gender violence, and she founded the fact-checking and investigative outlet The Observer. Her words arose from experience with lawsuits, surveillance, employment pressure, harassment, and a 2021 abduction linked in time to sensitive reporting.

The phrase “do not sell themselves” points to financial and political leverage, but it should not become a casual accusation against other journalists. Media economics are complicated, and independence must be demonstrated through practices rather than claimed as personal purity. Readers deserve disclosure of relevant funding, ownership, sponsorship, and conflicts of interest. Editors should separate advertising decisions from coverage, label opinion and paid material, publish correction policies, and show the documents behind significant findings when source safety and law permit. Transparency makes independence observable.

Regional investigative reporters face particular pressure because local officials, businesses, advertisers, police, and news organizations often operate in overlapping networks. Strong coverage maps those relationships with records instead of insinuation. Reporters can use procurement databases, court filings, budgets, company registries, and freedom-of-information requests to establish a chronology. Sensitive notes should be encrypted and backed up, and major investigations should be shared with trusted editors so the work does not depend on one device or one person. Every serious allegation needs a precise request for response and enough time for a meaningful answer.

Montaño’s statement remains relevant because freedom of expression can be weakened without formal censorship. Lawsuits, exclusion from information, coordinated harassment, surveillance, and economic isolation may all raise the cost of reporting. The public-interest response is not louder rhetoric but stronger evidence and collaboration. Readers can ask whether an investigation shows its method, distinguishes fact from inference, and follows the money to a documented conclusion. Montaño’s legacy is the insistence that local accountability journalism is a democratic service. Its credibility rests on independence that can be audited: clear sourcing, honest uncertainty, visible corrections, secure records, and continued reporting after powerful subjects would prefer the questions to stop. Collaborating outlets can further reduce isolation by sharing document indexes, publication plans, and responsibility for follow-up without exposing confidential sources. That cooperation strengthens continuity.