Gente de NAHJ: Claudia Amaro is building a media empire in Kansas
Claudia Amaro gets recognized at the grocery store. Not for her face, but for her voice.
A year after she started Planeta Venus — a weekly Spanish-language radio program in Wichita, Kansas, that features politicians, doctors, community leaders and everyday people talking about Latino issues — the reach and impact of Amaro’s work began to come into focus.
“For about a year I thought I was talking to myself and my mom,” she said. But then, “people started recognizing my voice in stores. They would ask me, ‘Are you Planeta Venus?’ ”
For Amaro, the radio station was the start of a burgeoning media empire. A decade after Planeta Venus launched in 2015, Amaro now oversees a news site, radio station, mobile app and a monthly newspaper that serves Wichita and the Spanish-speaking community of rural Kansas.
“Two local situations happened in the community and I was complaining, angry that the media wasn’t covering it,” she said. “And at one point, my husband said to me, ‘Well, if they’re not covering it, the only one who can do it is you.’ “
Amaro sees her work as a public service to her community. She provides resources and information through her news coverage, but also offers events, like a basic computing class for Latino adults.
Born in Tijuana, Mexico, Amaro moved to the U.S. when she was 12. She overstayed her visa and missed being able to qualify for amnesty under the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 by just a few years. Back then, she thought getting a college education seemed impossible. In 2006, her husband was deported to Mexico.
She followed him with their son, who was born in the U.S., but life in Mexico was challenging. In 2013, she joined the Dream 9 — nine activists who, like her, had grown up in the U.S. but lacked legal status — and crossed the U.S.-Mexico border wearing graduation caps and gowns and demanding asylum in protest to then-President Barack Obama’s assertion that his administration was only deporting criminals.
After 17 days at Eloy’s Immigration Detention Center in Arizona, she was released and returned to her son in Wichita.
“I realized that the Latino community had grown even more when I left, but we still didn’t have news in Spanish,” she said. “Latinos in Kansas were living in the shadows without news. … There are families who’ve lived there for 10, 20 years and still don’t know how the systems work. It hurt me a lot that they didn’t feel integrated after so many years in a community.”
Earlier this year, Amaro’s application for a green card was denied.
While she is afraid that she may still be targeted by immigration enforcement, she is committed to her work — and her community.
“Yo no voy a permitir que esto pare mi vida, que pare mis sueños. Pues voy a morir en la raya,” Amaro said. “Si me tiene que pasar me tiene que pasar.”
Susan A. Barnett is a recent University of Arizona graduate with a master’s degree in bilingual journalism. She is the co-founder of the Tucson Spotlight, and has been named a 2025–26 Chips Quinn Fellow. Reach her at susan [at] tucsonspotlight [dot] org or on Instagram @Susanitalareportera.
What a great recognition! 😊