Fear of immigration enforcement can reshape the public life of a business. It can limit what owners say to reporters and distort the picture communities get of who is building, hiring and investing locally.
That was one of the clearest takeaways from Technical.ly reporter Alice Crow’s recent appearance on City Cast Pittsburgh, where she discussed her reporting on how heightened ICE enforcement is affecting immigrant entrepreneurs in the region.
Alongside the economic strain, she described a climate in which even speaking on the record can feel dangerous.
“I saw the increase in arrests. I saw the increase in the raids,” Crow told City Cast Pittsburgh executive producer Mallory Falk. “After reporting on immigrant entrepreneurship in the past, I thought, well, what’s the effect?”
Reporting on the topic has become difficult.
“I started calling around to people I knew,” Crow said, “and people were generally scared about drawing attention to themselves in any way.”
The business owner at the center of the recent Technical.ly article agreed to speak only on the condition of complete anonymity, without even initials published. The concern was not abstract, Crow said, noting that business owners already worry that public comments can carry a financial cost, especially when customers, critics or bad-faith actors are paying attention.
“There was a recent Public Source article that kind of speaks to this, that even business owners who are not immigrants, who are just speaking out about how they don’t like ICE enforcement tactics, they can receive backlash that affects their business,” Crow said.
Crow also pointed to the wider atmosphere of retaliation that has taken hold over the last year, including federal moves to pull back funding from universities. In that environment, she said, people are making rational decisions about visibility, exposure and risk.
“So I think that there is serious fear,” Crow said, “and it doesn’t come from nowhere.”