Jika Gonzalez

Producer, Cinematographer

For decades, a small village in Alaska has been disintegrating and falling into the surrounding river. And for decades, the village’s residents, most of them native Alaskans, have been asking state and federal agencies for the help and funding they need to relocate the entire community. So far, the money they’ve gathered falls far short of the estimated $130 million they’ll ultimately need to make that happen. Now, the village is running out of time.  

 Since it was founded in the 1950s, the village of Newtok has lost nearly a mile of coastline. The reason for that isn’t under dispute: climate change has caused the permafrost under the village to melt, allowing the surrounding water to eat away at the shore. Because of this, it’s not uncommon to see large chunks of land crumble and fall into the water during a storm. According to the Army Corps of Engineers, entire buildings along the shore could begin to fall into the water within the year. At the moment,there’s just 40 feet of land standing between the first house and disaster.  

VICE News visited Newtok and spoke with residents who might soon lose their homes. In Newtok, VICE witnessed the loss of 10 feet of land — in just four days.

One Storm Away

Thousands of migrants Central America have trekked across Mexico as part of the wave after wave of caravans fleeing persecution, violence, and poverty in their home countries.

Among the group are scores of teenagers traveling alone and dreaming of a life in the United States that could help provide for their loved ones back home—most of them unaware of the threats of arrest and deportation made by President Trump and other U.S. officials.

Walking to America with the Migrant Caravan | VICE News Tonight Special Report (HBO)

The U.S. government hit a deadline last week to reunite more than 2,500 children separated from their parents under the Trump Administration's "zero tolerance" immigration policy. VICE News gets rare access to what the torturous experience was like from separation to reunification for one family.

The U.S. government had a deadline on July 26th, 2018  to reunite more than 2,500 children separated from their parents under the Trump Administration's "zero tolerance" immigration policy. VICE News got rare access to what the torturous experience was like from separation to reunification for one family.  In a powerful half-hour episode, "Zero Tolerance" uncovers the chaos and confusion created by a harsh policy the government was clearly not prepared to manage. From Texas to Alabama to Guatemala, VICE News follows one family trying to find a 7-year-old boy separated from his father. 



Zero Tolerance

Kentucky is at the center of what experts are calling the worst black lung epidemic on record. But instead of making it easier for miners to get access to health care, Kentucky’s lawmakers passed a law that may soon hinder miners’ ability to obtain workers’ compensation benefits.  The new law, which goes into effect on July 14th, bars federally certified radiologists from assessing coal miners’ X-rays in state black lung workers’ compensation claims. Instead, the state will require that only pulmonologists, physicians whose focus is lung disease, be allowed to judge X-rays for benefit claims. Right now, there are only 11 doctors in Kentucky who are certified to examine X-rays for state benefits claims, and the new law will cut that number down to five.

Black Lung

Poland has some of the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe. It's also accepted more than a million Ukrainian refugees since the start of the war. Now, activists are providing refugees seeking abortion care with information on access, at great personal risk.

Ukrainian Refugees Arrive In Reproductive Rights Nightmare

President Trump has announced that the Unites States would pull out of the Paris Climate Accord. One of the motivations behind this decision was the potential to keep a major campaign promise: bringing jobs back to coal country. But the demand for coal is already drying up. Paris may be out, but so is coal.  

Despite President Trump’s plan to revive the coal industry, 255 coal plants have closed or have announced their closure since 2010. Two of these plants are in the Trump strong hold of Adams County, Ohio, where the J.M. Stuart Station and the Killen Station are scheduled to close next year.  

These plants are responsible for some 700 jobs in the small community of 28,000 people.  While that may not seem like much, 700 jobs translates to about $35 million in salaries and $9 million in property taxes, or roughly $50 million of the county’s economy.  

Local leaders are trying to figure out how to prevent decades of economic instability and recovery after the plants are shut down.  

This segment originally aired June 1, 2017, on VICE News Tonight on HBO. 

Coal Plants Close

When Murder Isin't Murder

Four months after the Trump administration ended the practice of separating families at the US-Mexico border, there are still scores of parents and kids to be reunified. And the ACLU is tasked with one of the biggest reunification challenges: finding the 400-plus parents who were deported without their children.  

According to the latest data, 254 children are still in government custody, with parents outside of the U.S. More than half of these children are waiting to be reunited, or to have their wishes communicated to the government. The ACLU, tasked by a federal judge after bringing suit against the administration, has recently been overseeing these efforts.  

“When we filed this lawsuit, did I think I would be here four or five months later in Guatemala having to find these families?” Lee Gelernt, the head attorney arguing the ACLU’s case, told VICE News. “No.”  

But finding deported parents, who often live in rural towns and are not trusting of cold calls, is hard to do from the U.S. And without support from the U.S. or Guatemalan governments, this work falls to local lawyers like Aroldo Palacios.  

Palacios, who works part-time with one of the American NGOs that has partnered with the ACLU, has found 19 deported parents thus far. One morning earlier this month, he boarded a public bus and went to a small village close to the Mexican border to reach Erik, who was deported without his 8-year-old son in June.  

VICE News goes to Guatemala to see what it takes to clean up the chaos created by zero tolerance. 