Most businesses are struggling with ongoing inflation, tariffs and uncertainty sparked by President Donald Trump’s trade war, among a litany of challenges.
Latino businesses in the Chicago area are particularly affected by Trump’s threats of mass deportation. About one-third of the city’s population is Latino, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. And nearly 75% of Illinois’ undocumented population hails from Latin America.
In the months after Trump’s inauguration, initial fears of raids by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement calmed. Then in recent months, ICE intensified arrests in Chicago.
Now the city is braced for the possible arrival of the National Guard soon, with Trump citing crime as the reason for deployment even though violence has dropped sharply compared to last year. His administration also announced a ramped-up deportation campaign after Labor Day.
In spite of all this, the 26th annual Mexican Independence Day parade is still planned for Sept. 14, according to the Little Village Chamber of Commerce, which organizes the event. The procession is one of the Midwest’s largest parades and normally draws crowds of more than 400,000 people to Little Village on the West Side.
Little Village — nicknamed the “Mexico of the Midwest” — is home to what is normally the city’s second-highest grossing retail strip after Michigan Avenue, according to the chamber.
On 26th Street, the neighborhood’s main commercial corridor, there were some 500 businesses that generated more than $1 billion in annual revenue, according to a 2020 report from the chamber. Nearly 1 million people, about half of whom are Latino, live within five miles of Little Village.
But in the weeks after Trump’s inauguration in January, foot traffic in the neighborhood was less than half of normal levels, Jennifer Aguilar, the chamber’s executive director, estimated.
One Chicago business owner who works with Latino retailers told me U.S. immigration policies have hurt his sales. The man, who asked not be identified, estimated in April that revenue at his wholesale business was down 40% compared to the same period last year.
At least six of his customers — Latino-owned retailers in Little Village, Pulaski Road, Aurora and Elgin — had closed their shops. He said they were afraid of Trump’s deportation threats, so they shuttered their doors before returning to Mexico.
In general, customers were spending less and saving money to weather economic uncertainty, he added.
The Mexico-born business owner was candid about his observations and didn’t mind being quoted by name at the time. I even rode with him as he drove to visit clients a few months ago. Little Village would typically be packed with weekend shoppers and vendors, he said.
But on a spring Friday afternoon, 26th Street was fairly quiet except for a few vendors selling soccer jerseys, hot dogs with bacon, tamales and gabanes — traditional Mexican ponchos.
Latinos from Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and other nearby states normally come to Little Village to shop and eat but were afraid to come to Chicago, he said.
Then just before the article I wrote was expected to run, the wholesaler got spooked. Although he is a U.S. citizen, he no longer wanted his name in the news because of concerns over retaliation. The article was scrapped. Such skittishness shows how hard it is to illustrate the human impact of immigration policies.
But recent data supports the business owner’s observations. The country’s foreign-born labor force has shrunk by about 1.2 million workers since January. Due to federal immigration policy “the flow into our labor forces is just a great deal slower,” Jerome Powell, chair of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, said in July.
This is happening when many businesses nationwide are already struggling with labor shortages.
Aggressive immigration policies have an impact across Chicago and elsewhere in the country. Super Mall near Midway Airport is chock-full of goods geared toward Latino customers. Within the indoor marketplace, stalls sell everything from cowboys hats and boots to glittering dresses, luggage and jewelry. Travel agencies advertise flights to Mexico.
Business owner Esther Santiago runs two large stalls brimming with evening gowns and quinceañera dresses. On a spring afternoon, Super Mall should have been bustling with weekend shoppers who come from as far as Michigan, Missouri and Ohio, she said. But the Super Mall’s aisles were mostly empty.
When I checked in with Santiago recently, she said business was still slow because of concerns about immigration raids.
In spite of the latest government actions, immigrants have weathered similar challenges before.
Blanca Soto, chief operating officer of the Little Village Chamber of Commerce and a lifelong neighborhood resident, told me earlier this year there have been waves of deportations in previous administrations. As worrying as the current situation may be, the threats are not new and people have carried on.
“The new generation is dealing with issues of previous generations,” Soto said. “We’ll get through it.”
Amy Yee is a business and economy reporter for the Sun-Times. She is author of “Far From the Rooftop of the World: Travels among Tibetan Refugees on Four Continents,” with a foreword by the Dalai Lama.