Immigration raids in the United States are leaving restaurants like Taco Giro, a landmark Mexican establishment in southern Arizona, in limbo. The restaurant chain has been forced to close several of its locations after losing workers and facing high legal costs following an immigration raid. César Rodríguez, director of operations for the southern Arizona restaurant chain, told EFE they were forced to indefinitely close seven of their ten establishments after a surprise operation by heavily armed agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), who arrested 46 workers. "We lost 10% of our employees in an instant," Rodríguez emphasized, referring to the December 5th raid, during which agents also took documents related to worker hiring. He explained that agents also visited the homes of several employees, increasing the number of detentions. Rodríguez stated that hiring and training new workers takes time, as even immigrants with citizenship fear the raids, not for themselves, but for their undocumented family members. The Ramos Mora brothers, who started the restaurant chain in south Tucson in 2008, refused to speak about the case. Meanwhile, ICE stated that the operation against Taco Giro was the result of a long investigation related to the hiring of undocumented workers, cash payments, as well as tax and drug trafficking issues. Rodríguez called these accusations "ridiculous." "Some clientele is afraid to come to the restaurant because they fear ICE will return to the establishment," EFE was told by Mario Ramírez, a regular customer of Taco Giro, during a visit to the nearly empty establishment. Less security, declining economy "Federal, targeted, disruptive, and violent raids do not make our community safer, nor do they lower prices for Tucson residents," Tucson Mayor Regina Romero told EFE. For the city's first Latina mayor, enforcing the law is never an excuse to disrupt the local economy. The aftermath of ICE Marco Antonio López, owner of Beef Master Meat Market in Tucson, Arizona, is still trying to recover from a similar experience. López's business was one of the first visited by ICE agents in March of last year, during one of the first immigration operations under the second Trump administration in southern Arizona. Like Taco Giro, the first blow was the loss of employees. Although no one was arrested by ICE agents during the raid, the next day, no one showed up for work. "It was very hard; my wife and children had to help me to keep the business going," López told EFE. He recalled it took him "months" to hire employees again and for his customer base to return. However, he said that nine months after being targeted by an ICE raid, he is still feeling the effects, especially the legal ones, as he continues to answer questions and provide documentation to the federal government, which threatens to punish him with a hefty fine. "I don't want to say the amount, but if I have to pay that much money, I think my business won't survive," he stated. The business owner also incurred legal fees and the cost of training an employee to use the federal E-Verify system for employer immigration verification. The situation affects several cities with a high number of raids. In Los Angeles, after interviewing nearly 200 business owners in the most affected areas, 43% of Hispanic owners reported income losses of 50% or more, a figure that rises to 68% among those who do not speak English, according to a November report by the Los Angeles Economic Equity Accelerator and Fellowship (LEAAF). In its opinion, these actions cause serious collateral damage to small businesses and interfere with legal commercial activity. "They scare away long-term employees, regardless of their immigration status, and use federal resources to intimidate people based solely on their skin color or accent." Romero stated that these operations "come to further increase the economic problems for the economies of the communities, which have been severely impacted by the rise in rental prices and basic foodstuffs."
