A group of laborers in dirt-streaked orange hoodies chat as they gather around tables pushed together at El Guanaco, a Salvadoran restaurant tucked away in a strip mall in north St. Louis County.
The mood in the dining room is convivial as scents of steaming baleadas, fried plantains and burritos fill the air. A patron at the checkout counter raves about the pupusas — thick, handmade griddle cakes made from cornmeal, often filled with beans, cheese and meat — and declares them the best in St. Louis.
But the atmosphere at El Guanaco has tensed since President Donald Trump took office last month. The president’s Day 1 executive order to immediately crack down on and deport those without legal status in the United States has put some small businesses, like Dinora Soler’s, in the crosshairs.
“A lot has changed,” Soler lamented in Spanish while sitting at a nearby table. “Our sales have plummeted, I think around 80%.”
She added that she’s had to reduce some employees' hours and lay off others. What used to be a busy kitchen with six or seven cooks on a weekend is now down to just two.
“Our clients are afraid,” Soler said. “It’s the same story at my store. Many of my clients have been deported. … We've all come here to fight and work. It's sad to see they're not here anymore and that they can't keep fighting for their families.”
As St. Louis-area businesses like Solar's feel the financial toll of national immigration policy and enforcement changes, many Latino-owned locales are planning to rally together to resist and prove how much the region relies on them.
The threat
Maria, a woman without legal status who resides in St. Louis County, said she has felt similarly to Soler. St. Louis Public Radio is withholding her last name due to the threat of deportation.
“It's hard to think about risking driving anywhere because one day my children could see their mom never arrive home,” she said in Spanish, adding she’s had to avoid Mexican stores and restaurants due to fears of being targeted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials. “It's sad to see how many people support this effort.”
Maria’s biggest fear became a possible reality for one family detained in north St. Louis County on Jan. 26.
A bystander livestreamed the dramatic moment when ICE agents detained a man and his wife outside El Guanaco as they were on their way to church, leaving their grown children — both citizens — behind. The videos quickly gained thousands of views and sparked more than 100 comments.
“Ladies and gentlemen, it’s true. They aren’t just picking up people with criminal backgrounds,” said Antonio García, the co-owner of La Tejana Taqueria in nearby St. Ann, who filmed the tail end of the arrest. “They’re taking everyone. It’s called racial profiling. If you’re Latino — you’re going to be stopped."
Despite the couple's eventual release, the incident has shaken members of the already fearful immigrant community, many of whom live in constant worry of being detained or deported.
It’s unclear how much ICE has stepped up its presence in the region, though there have been reports of several incidents on social media — some confirmed, some not. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the agency that oversees ICE, did not respond to several St. Louis Public Radio inquiries related to this story.
The cost of deportation
Trump’s plan to carry out "the largest deportation operation in the history of our country" faces significant challenges, including potential resistance from federal courts, logistical issues around where to house large numbers of individuals without legal status and the financial costs of carrying out such an operation.
Experts also warn about the potential economic consequences of mass deportations. The American Immigration Council, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, projects that removing workers without legal status from U.S. industries could reduce the country’s GDP by 4.2% to 6.8%. This would be accompanied by a notable drop in tax revenue for the federal government.
In 2022, undocumented immigrant households contributed $46.8 billion in federal taxes and $29.3 billion in state and local taxes, according to the nonprofit. Additionally, they contributed $22.6 billion to Social Security and $5.7 billion to Medicare during the same year.“
The impact would also be felt at the state level.
Last summer, a Missouri House interim committee reported that people without legal status in the state contributed significantly to its economy. In 2022, they paid almost $114 million in Missouri taxes, but advocates note that the group cannot access tax-funded public benefits such as Medicaid and Social Security.
Their economic activity supported 160,000 jobs and generated $19 billion to the state’s annual revenue. The committee report concludes that the financial investment provides “real economic stability that benefits all Missourians.”
“On a national level, the benefits are profound,” the state interim committee’s authors wrote. “Granting work authorization to illegal immigrants (sic) would increase their tax contributions by allowing them to earn a higher wage.”
In analyzing the financial toll behind Trump's plans, researchers from the American Immigration Council argue that the cost to U.S.-born Americans — both in tax dollars spent and economic output lost — pales in comparison to the devastation that immigrants without legal status and their families would suffer if mass deportations were to occur.
“There is no way to engage in mass deportation without fundamentally changing the federal government, the national economy, and, ultimately, America itself," the researchers concluded.
Organizing resistance
On a recent evening, about 40 small-business owners, lawyers, nonprofit organizers and community influencers packed into a small room at another Mexican restaurant in north St. Louis County.
The meeting was a rendezvous of various underground aid networks in the St. Louis area — normally a whisper network of text chains and private Facebook groups — coming together to strategize on combating misinformation, organizing mutual aid and preparing those without legal status for potential detention and deportation.
One woman asked attorneys at the meeting what would happen to someone’s home and bank accounts if they were deported. Could it go to her kids? Could she sign ownership away to a relative?
“Our community is very scared of what's going on,” said García, the St. Ann restaurant owner. “I have been talking to leaders in the community. How can we help? How can we distribute more information on what to do and how to do it?”
García said he’s seen immigration crackdowns before. But this time feels different.
“That was a breaking point where I said, I have to do something more than what I have done,” he said while reflecting on witnessing a family being split up by ICE. “When you see it in person, you see it's a different kind of feeling. I need to do something for them. I need to do something for my people.”
One attendee planned a protest that brought more than 1,000 people to downtown St. Louis, another began collecting donations to cover groceries and legal fees for community members without legal status.
Then an idea was floated: What if there was a weeklong strike among the immigrant community?
A similar nationwide action was held on Monday, but some organizers say one day is not enough. The group settled on doing a grassroots Missouri-specific strike from Feb. 11 to Feb. 18 in hopes of catching the attention of other residents and lawmakers.
The organizer’s flyer reads: No work. No school. No spending.
García and Soler are joining the roughly 30 St. Louis-area businesses — clothing boutiques, markets, nightclubs, restaurants, landscaping workers and bakeries among others — to participate in the strike, despite the risk of financial loss.
“No amount of money can replace peace of mind,” García said, noting he was going to dip into his business’ emergency funds to pay his workers. “We were going to lose some money that week, but we're going to gain a lot more.”
Gabby Moreno, a 28-year-old from Hazelwood who is helping coordinate the strike, said the organizers’ goal is to show the wide-sweeping economic and labor contributions those who lack legal status have on the region and across industries.
“We are an essential part of this country,” she said. “I feel like a week without immigrants would definitely make an impact and maybe open some eyes to see that we really are important here, and we really do matter.”
While the future is uncertain, St. Louis-area residents without legal status like Maria say they will continue to do their part in the community and continue trying to accomplish the American Dream despite the pain they may feel in this fraught moment.
“No matter the circumstance, we will pick ourselves up,” she said in Spanish. “We will fight for one more day. We will fight for one more dream. We will fight for the hope that we will have a better tomorrow for our children."
