El Pregonero is a Catholic, Spanish-language weekly newspaper published by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington's Carroll Publishing Company.
It is the oldest, continuously published, Spanish-language weekly newspaper in the nation's capitol, first published in 1977 by the Spanish Catholic Center, a social services agency of the Archdiocese .The newspaper's founding editor was Father Sean O'Malley, O.F.M. Cap., who was executive director of the Spanish Catholic Center at the time of the newspaper's inception and who now serves as the cardinal-archbishop of the Archdiocese of Boston.
El Pregonero provides coverage of issues and trends affecting the Hispanic immigrant experience in the Washington, D.C., are from a Catholic perspective. It is a charter member of the National Association of Hispanic Publications, and has won more than 150 awards over the last 20 years for editorial content, design and general excellence from the NAHP and from the Catholic Press Association of the U.S. and Canada .
In its early years, El Pregonero appeared as a mimeographed newsletter, distributed primarily in the Adams Morgan and Mount Pleasant neighborhoods around the Spanish Catholic Center's office near 16th and Monroe Streets, NW, in Washington, D.C. As the Hispanic population settled in other neighborhoods in D.C. and the nearby Maryland and Virginia suburbs, the newspaper adopted a more traditional tabloid format and circulated more copies in street boxes and at other bulk-drop locations. Under the direction of the late Cardinal James A. Hickey, Archbishop of Washington, the newspaper was taken over by Carroll Publishing in 1985. Its circulation grew to as many as 50,000 copies weekly until the company eliminated its Virginia distribution to focus on service to the Hispanic population within the geographical boundaries of the Archdiocese of Washington, which includes D.C., and Montgomery, Prince George's, Calvert, St. Mary's and Charles counties in Maryland. It currently circulates 38,000 free copies weekly, with a Thursday dateline.
Editor Oscar Reyes helped shape the newspaper's content and direction after Carroll took over the publication of El Pregonero in 1985. Reyes came to the U.S. from Nicaragua after founding the School of Journalism at the National University of Honduras, where he was its director for 10 years. He was assistant editor and editor of two newspapers in Nicaragua, and earned a master's degree from the University of Minnesota. Reyes retired in 2005 and was succeeded by Rafael Roncal, who remains El Pregonero's editor.
Carroll Publishing Company also publishes the official newspaper of the Archdiocese of Washington, the Catholic Standard.