{"id":323886,"date":"2026-08-18T09:56:26","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T09:56:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/323886\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T09:56:26","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T09:56:26","slug":"flatbush-businesses-report-less-foot-traffic-amid-trump-immigration-crackdown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/323886\/","title":{"rendered":"Flatbush Businesses Report Less Foot Traffic Amid Trump Immigration Crackdown"},"content":{"rendered":"

This story was\u00a0originally published<\/a>\u00a0by Documented. Sign up for their newsletter at documentedny.com\/newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At\u00a0Fleur de Lis Beauty & Esthetics<\/a>\u00a0in Flatbush, Brooklyn, clients typically arrive with an appointment. But in the nearly 10 years the luxury medical spa has been in the community, co-owner Wendy Jules says daily walk-ins weren\u2019t unusual.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou would get like at least five to 10 people come in and say, \u2018What services do you offer over in the neighborhood\u2019 or \u2018We\u2019re visiting from out of town,\u2019\u201d said Jules.<\/p>\n

In recent months, those casual drop-ins have become much less common. In July, Jules said there were weeks when only about four people stopped in \u2014 a drastic change, especially in a neighborhood where summer typically brings more people outside.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can definitely see there\u2019s a downturn on the activity in the street,\u201d she said. \u201cThere\u2019s usually more people out, more people shopping, or people stopping in to see what services are being offered.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jules first noticed the slowdown around the end of May, roughly the same time businesses and residents began sharing concerns about U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity in the area.<\/p>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t seen it because I don\u2019t know if they\u2019re in uniform or not,\u201d she recalled, \u201cbut there have been other businesses who would say, \u2018Hey, there\u2019s some activity on this street. Stay vigilant and keep your eyes open.\u2019 It\u2019s scary.\u201d<\/p>\n

That fear extends beyond Fleur de Lis, and has affected businesses across Flatbush, one of Brooklyn\u2019s largest immigrant communities. The neighborhood is home to roughly\u00a020% of New York City\u2019s Caribbean community<\/a>\u00a0and many of its businesses are immigrant-owned.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A recent\u00a0survey<\/a>\u00a0conducted by the\u00a0Flatbush-Nostrand Junction Business Improvement District<\/a>\u00a0found that 70% of local business owners who responded reported a decrease in foot traffic within the last year. Fifty percent said customers had explicitly raised concerns about ICE and 33% anticipated a likely reduction in their workforce. This has been a trend across New York City, where immigrant-heavy neighborhoods have seen a decline in business and foot traffic, Documented\u00a0previously reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Kenneth Mbonu, president and executive director of the Flatbush-Nostrand Junction Business Improvement District, said those numbers are especially concerning for the corridor\u2019s smallest stores.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of these businesses are brick-and-mortar,so they have a location on the commercial corridor and many of them survive primarily by the foot traffic,\u201d Mbonu told Documented.<\/p>\n

More than 80% of businesses in the district are minority-owned, according to Mbonu, who estimates that of those minorities, more than 70% are immigrants.<\/p>\n

Many of the businesses, Mbonu said, were already adjusting to seeing fewer customers, a trend that began during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople were working from home, so the commute to and from work was less,\u201d he explained. \u201cBut with those slight declines in foot traffic in the area, that affected a lot of us, more businesses that can\u2019t really transform directly to these kinds of changes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smaller businesses have fewer ways to adapt when customers stop showing up in person, Mbonu said, including limited online and social media infrastructure.<\/p>\n

Those pressures have since been compounded by\u00a0tariffs<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0heightened immigration enforcement<\/a>\u00a0under the Trump administration. The BID survey published in July asked merchants about both.<\/p>\n

Among owners willing to disclose financial details, Mbonu said some reported significant losses.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe saw that a lot of their revenues had dropped by even up to 50%. And that\u2019s a drastic situation for many of these businesses because many of them would not be able to pay their rent, which is usually their biggest cost,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The decline in foot traffic has led some merchants to begin delivering products directly to people. \u201cBut that is an added cost on them,\u201d Mbonu said. \u201cBut they don\u2019t have a choice. They have to keep their clients happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Immigration enforcement is also affecting staffing. Mbonu said some merchants have reported multiple ICE raids, while workers with pending immigration applications who are allowed to work still fear leaving home or reporting to their jobs.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of them did not want to take any risk due to the indiscriminate nature of the ICE arrests and so on,\u201d Mbonu said. \u201cIt\u2019s just not a healthy environment for a lot of the small businesses and their challenges.\u201d<\/p>\n

That fear is not confined to people without legal status, he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of them even have green cards or some of them even have their U.S. passports. They\u2019re legal. But just the fear of being arrested in error and finding themselves in Venezuela and having to go through the process could be quite intimidating and frightening,\u201d he said. \u201cSo they just don\u2019t want to come out.\u201d More than 170 U.S. citizens were detained by ICE in 2025,\u00a0according to ProPublica<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In Flatbush\u2019s large Caribbean immigrant community, these conversations have also included uncertainty surrounding\u00a0Temporary Protected Status<\/a>\u00a0and what changes could mean for Haitians who have spent years building lives in the United States. Many businesses have lost staff or closed because of TPS work authorization terminations,\u00a0as Documented previously reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For Jules, a child of Haitian immigrants, the end of TPS work authorization has hit particularly close to home. It has affected her business, her customers, her neighborhood, and her family.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThey [Haitians who no longer have TPS] have homes, they have cars, they have careers. Like, now does everybody just get up and go to Haiti and start over? Like, how does this work?\u201d Jules said, adding that some have chosen to leave the country rather than risk detention.<\/p>\n

The consequences can ripple through entire families, particularly in immigrant communities where relatives may pool resources, financially support one another or send money to family members in the Caribbean.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow all of the money that you\u2019ve saved or your resources are drained through lawyers. You\u2019re concerned about if your parent is eating, is your cousin eating? What if the person is pregnant and you know they\u2019re not getting the best treatment? It\u2019s not like you\u2019re saying, \u2018OK, let\u2019s put you on a JetBlue flight and send you home.\u2019 You\u2019re going from facility to facility, far away to be processed and documented and all this stuff,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

While immigration enforcement has not changed the services Fleur de Lis provides, Jules has found herself using the business as another place to share information with people worried about what could happen to them or their relatives.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always tell\u00a0 people who are dealing with that situation, \u2018Be very careful. Make sure you\u2019re walking with your documents. If you have to report to somewhere, please let your family know. Get a power of attorney so if something does happen that you can have someone speak on your behalf,\u2019\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

For the BID, documenting those experiences is a first step toward helping merchants. Mbonu said the organization hopes to use the survey findings to work with agencies and community partners on solutions for businesses confronting lower foot traffic, staffing concerns, higher costs and an increasingly anxious customer base.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe small micro businesses are the crux of our community and nobody really actually appreciates the impact they have on the business community and on the community and the vibrancy of the neighborhood as a whole,\u201d Mbonu said. \u201cBut once this has been challenged, the impact is quite seen here. And it\u2019s just that we need to come up with flexible approaches to help solve many of these problems.\u201d<\/p>\n

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