Jorge Ramos

Jorge Ramos: biography

Jorge Ramos is a Mexican-American journalist and author. Ramos tried to work in Mexico, but then he left this country because of censorship and in the U.S.A. he has been working for over than thirty-five years with the whole freedom. He is also an author of twelve books.

He was on the cover of Time’s magazine issue, “100 most influential people in the world” (2015) and also on the roster of “the 25 most influential Hispanics in the United States”. The Wall Street Journal called Jorge "Star newscaster of Hispanic TV" and "Hispanic TV's No. 1 correspondent and a key to a huge voting bloc".

Childhood and youth

Jorge was born in Mexico in 1958; his family belonged to the Roman Catholic Church. He was raised by both his parents and, as he claims, he had a rather happy childhood. His father was an architect and also a permanent opponent of Ramos. The point is that Jorge has always been a rebel. He used to stand up against his dad in their disputes, and at school, he didn't listen to his teachers – monks. By the way, he went to Catholic schools where he was abused by priests, as he says.

The vision of Jorge's childhood we can find in the latest film created by Alfonso Cuarón, Roma (2018). In his article on Univision News Ramos writes: “I tried for many years to recover my childhood in Mexico, collecting as many details as possible. And while I have written about childhood many times, I have never been able to convey my own memories in vivid images and recalled moments. When I watched ‘Roma,’ I thought to myself: “This is it.”

Career

Ramos got his bachelor degree at the program Communications at The Ibero-American University in Mexico City and a master’s degree at the University of Miami.

Jorge’s career started at the television station, XEW-TV in Mexico. Even when Ramos was very young, he already was a rebel and a supporter of freedom of speech. So, when he created a story that criticized Mexico's government, and it got censored, Jorge quit this job and left Mexico.

He went to Los Angeles, California on a student visa. In the 1984 year, KMEX-TV, department of the Spanish International Network (SIN) in L. A., hired him. At this place Ramon felt delighted; he thought that he could express freely in contradistinction to his work in Mexico. In 1986, he became the host of Mundo Latino, the morning program. Then, in 1987, this network (SIN) was rebranded as the Univision network. Since that year Jorge has been the anchorperson together with María Elena Salinas for Noticiero Univision. Now he is also an anchorman of Al Punto and America with Jorge Ramos, the second one, by the way, can be found in the format of a podcast and also had a Twitter channel.

In his airings, Ramos has covered various significant events, including the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Salvadoran Civil War, the Persian Gulf War, the disintegration of the Soviet Union, etc. He has experience in interviewing different world leaders such as Barack Obama, George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Fidel Castro, and others. The results of polls amid American Latinos demonstrate Jorge as the most trusted and influential Hispanic in America. In 2002, he created Despierta Leyendo which became the first book club in the Spanish-language TV.

By the way, Jorge can be entangled sometimes with another J. Ramos, an Uruguayan sports commentator, who hosts Jorge Ramos y Su Banda, or with J. R, who is now a retired anchor at the Telemundo network.

In 2015, Donald Trump announced about himself running for a President, and Ramos tried to schedule an interview with him for a long time. When he sent Trump a handwritten request, Trump posted it on his Instagram, which showed to everybody Jorge’s cell phone number. Later, Donald Trump deleted this post. A presidential candidate has also filed a lawsuit against Univision network for its decision to give up the Miss Universe pageant because of the one of the candidate's remarks about Mexican immigrants.

In 2016, Jorge’s documentary Hate Rising aired on Univision and Fusion. Ramos dedicated this film to the issue of racial slurs and abuses in the whole country. The journalist has been preparing for that film for around a year, and he has been traveling across the country, meeting members of different hate organizations such as Ku Klux Klan and neo-Nazis.

Speaking about money, Jorge Ramos has a net worth of $12 million and a salary of around $3 million per year.

Personal life

At present, Jorge lives in Miami, Florida. Every Saturday morning he has been soccer with his fifty friends for more than twenty years. His team has a uniform; every member takes this event seriously. For Latinos, soccer is more than a sport; it's a kind of ideology.

In 2008 Ramos became an official United States citizen, by that year it turned out that he has been living in Mexico for twenty-five years and in the U. S. for the same amount of time.

"I finally recognized that I cannot be defined by one country. I am from both countries. It took me many years to make peace with that thought, and that I was never going back to Mexico," – Jorge said about his civic awareness in one of his interviews.

Speaking about Jorge’s love life, he has been married twice. First, he married Gina Montaner, a daughter of Mexican writer, Carlos Alberto Montaner. In 1988 their daughter, Paola, was born. Then, in w years, they got divorced, and Paola stayed with Gina in Spain. Jorge's second wife was a writer, Lisa Bolivar. The married in 1992 and had a child, Nicolas, and then divorced in the 2005 year. Then, he had a relationship with Ana de la Reguera, a Mexican actress, and since 2011 Ramos has been dating Chiquinquirá Delgado, a TV host, and an actress.

Although Jorge was taught at the Catholic school, he is an atheist, which is not surprising after priests’ abuses in childhood. Jorge is an activist in various spheres of life, and he condemned the head of the Catholic Church of the Vatican City, Pope Francis, for the process of canonization of Pope John Paul II, who, in Jorge’s opinion, had been covering abuses that were committed by priests.

Awards

Ramos has received eight Emmy Awards and Maria Moors Cabot Prize for his work as a journalist.

Bibliography

• 1998 – Detrás de la máscara
• 1999 – Lo que vi
• 2000 – The Other Face of America: Chronicles of the Immigrants Shaping Our Future
• 2001 – The Latino Wave: How Hispanics Are Transforming Politics in America
• 2001 – A la caza del león
• 2002 – No Borders: A Journalist's Search for Home
• 2005 – Dying to Cross: The Worst Immigrant Tragedy in American History
• 2005 – Morir en el intento
• 2007 – El regalo del tiempo: Cartas a mis hijos
• 2009 – A Country For all: An Immigrant Manifesto
• 2011 – Los Presidenciables
• 2018 – Stranger: the Challenge of a Latino Immigrant in the Trump Era