President Trump’s immigration enforcement policies are helping to shrink the large migrant enclaves in Chicago.
One indication is that the economy catering to migrants is facing strain in Chicago as President Trump’s immigration enforcement policies continue.
Of course, before Trump even came to office for his second term, progressive Democrat Mayor Brandon Johnson had already wrecked havoc on the city’s jobs makers by running one of the most anti-business administrations in Chicago history. With skyrocketing taxes and plans for even more, Chicago had seen a large number of businesses close down well before the president’s immigration crackdown.
In August, it was reported that the Windy City has lost 17 percent of its business sector over the last year, and the city is now at a ten-year low in the number of businesses operating there.
While the post COVID atmosphere has been hard enough on the city’s businesses — especially restaurants — President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement policies are also putting a strain on those businesses that cater to the migrant community in the neighborhoods that sit in the path of Trump’s “Operation Midway Blitz” law enforcement campaign.
Restaurants, in particular, in neighborhoods such as Chicago’s Little Village, Pilsen, and others are finding themselves on the verge of financial collapse as diners avoid going out for fear of getting crosswise with federal law enforcement, the Chicago Tribune reports.
“We’ve become unprofitable — we’re running at a loss,” said Marcos Carbajal, owner of the restaurant named Carnitas Uruapan. “I’m using my other two (locations) to keep people employed here and running at a loss so that I can try to get to the other side and just keep the doors open and keep people here. If I didn’t have three locations, this would have been over. I would just have to shut down.”
“We are dying a slow death,” Carbajal added.
The restaurateur also noted that when protesters confront ICE officers, that action ends up keeping people from venturing out for days afterward.
Businessman Esam Hani, who owns restaurants in Chicago and Milwaukee, said that another problem is that landlords are no longer cutting business a break like they did in 2020 as COVID hit.
“I have to dip into my personal savings to keep the doors open, but for how long can I do that?” Hani said. “The landlords are not making concessions for us like they did in COVID. We’re still making the monthly rents, paying our employees, paying gas and electric … all that kind of stuff. Those costs are still there.”
Hani told the Tribune that he has experienced about a 40 percent loss in sales, and thanks to Mayor Johnson, his expenses are “through the roof.”
He added that things are bad and if it continues into the next few months, “you’ll see a lot of small businesses start closing because they can’t pay their staff or they can’t pay their rent. That’s just how it is in our industry.”
The situation shows how some of Chicago’s neighborhoods have built their economies on migrants, both legal and illegal, and how having those migrants fleeing the area has undermined that economic activity.
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