From Neil Munro of Breitbart,
Minneapolis Mayor: Law Enforcement Wrecks My Sanctuary City Economy.
Over the past year, ICE has undertaken large-scale (surge) operations in cities across America. Nearly all of these cities are controlled by Democrats. Many of these are sanctuary cities.
But nowhere has the opposition to ICE been as aggressive or as prolonged as in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
I think Munro is on to a root cause of the anti-ICE phenomenon: Minneapolis (and to a lesser extent Minnesota) is uniquely dependent, economically, on the illegal immigration business model.
Local schools depend on immigrant children to fill the classrooms. Restaurants are dependent on low-cost immigrant labor. Businesses are dependent on spending by new arrivals.
And that spending is largely fueled by federal tax dollars brought in by (or on behalf of) new arrivals. Post-George-Floyd-riots, if you take away the new arrivals (as ICE is doing, every day), Minneapolis has nothing else going for it, economically.
From the Minneapolis Star Tribune,
Minneapolis businesses losing millions in sales each week as ICE operation continues.
Mayor Jabob Frey can check the city’s ledger and see that the sales tax revenue just isn’t coming in the door and he is panicking. The Star Tribune reports,
City and community leaders say the federal immigration crackdown in Minneapolis is causing an economic crisis.
With employees afraid to work and customers fearful, Minneapolis businesses are losing $10 million to $20 million in sales a week, with revenue down more than half in the two months since Operation Metro Surge began, according to city estimates.
Adding,
Immigrant-owned businesses that form the city’s cultural districts have been hit hardest, with estimated revenue losses of 80% to 100% as many have shut down, Hansen said.
The Lake Street Council estimated that the corridor’s more than 1,000 immigrant-owned businesses lost a cumulative $46 million in December and January.
If you are not familiar, Lake Street in south Minneapolis was both the epicenter of the George Floyd riots and of the recent ICE crackdown. Mayor Frey was counting on illegal immigrants to bring the city (or at least Lake Street) back. It is/was his business model.
Now what?
