Some restaurants in Omaha and Lincoln, the state’s largest cities, have announced they are temporarily closing their doors – citing concerns about increased immigration enforcement.
Both offer Latin food options. Omaha Fernando’s Café and Cantina owner Mitch Tempus said he had received a subpoena from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security requesting employee documentation.
He said the restaurant is cooperating fully, but that the inquiry resulted in workers being terminated. The Café and Cantina’s two locations are no longer able to operate at full staff. Tempus said the restaurant hopes to return to full operations as soon as possible.
“Every restauranteur is probably concerned about this whole immigration debacle we’re in at this time,” he said. “We’re all trying to run our business and take care of our families and our employees.”
Tempus said he doesn’t know why his restaurant was one to receive a subpoena and he isn’t sure if other restaurants in the area also received one.
These closures are not unique to Nebraska–at least one restaurant in Missouri has shut its doors due to similar concerns.
Many in the restaurant industry across the country have appealed to the President to ask for reprieve from immigration raids to stay in business. This follows the president’s decision to revoke the legal status of more than half a million migrants.
The restaurant in Lincoln posted in Spanish: “We raise our prayers for all our Latin brothers, especially for our Cuban and Venezuelan countrymen, who are being the most affected.”
The migrants most affected in the administration’s decision are from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
“Nobody knows what’s going to happen next with this current administration and so, it’s tough,” Tempus said. “It’s just kind of a tough situation, I think, for the whole country.”
He said his business is more of a family than a restaurant and that some of the workers that had to be let go had been there longer than he and his wife.
Fernando’s has since been able to reopen one of its locations.