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Eight agents entered Millies during a lunch rush to speak with the General Manager.
On May 6, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents unexpectedly visited local Washington restaurants, including Chef Geoff’s, Millie’s and Pupatella. The agents asked to see I-9 forms verifying employment eligibility, sparking fear within local communities, according to Fox 5. In a statement to the Washington Post, ICE said that it gave inspection notices to over 100 local businesses. Although ICE officials initially claimed no one was arrested as a result of these visits, as of May 12, around 200 arrests have been made; eight people were arrested on criminal warrants and 181 were arrested on administrative charges.
Although some restaurants reported short, casual interactions with agents, others reported more tense encounters. A worker at Absolute Thai, another restaurant impacted by these visits, said that ICE agents came before the restaurant opened and were “very nice.” According to the Washington Post, at Millie’s, eight agents entered through three separate doors during the lunch rush to speak with the general manager.
“A couple employees left for the rest of the day,” Bo Blair, president of Georgetown Events Hospitality Group, which includes Millie’s, said. “They were pretty rattled.”
Ava Benach, a Washington immigration attorney, added that these requests could have been sent out to restaurants by mail. “The fact that they chose to do it very visibly says that they were very interested in sending a message. Shock and awe,” she said.
ICE agents informed Georgetown Events CEO Marisa Casey that they were planning to return to Millie’s on May 12 to collect the I-9 forms, despite Casey’s explanation that they are kept at the restaurant’s corporate office. “We also don’t want them to go back to our restaurants and scare everybody,” she said.
Separately, immigration officials wearing Department of Homeland Security uniforms visited Chef Geoff’s restaurant’s New Mexico Avenue location at 10:30 a.m. on May 6. Requesting to see employees’ I-9 forms, ICE agents remained in the restaurant for over 90 minutes but made no arrests.
Reflecting on recent restaurant raids by ICE and Homeland Security officials, Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser stated in an interview with FOX News, “I have heard those reports… I am disturbed by them. It appears as though ICE is at restaurants, or even at neighborhoods, and it doesn’t look like they’re targeting criminals, and it does look like they’re disrupting.”
Many of these interventions from government officials come as a part of Trump’s beautification plans for Washington, as described in several of his recent executive orders. On March 28, Trump wrote in an executive order that the main initiatives of the beautification program include “directing maximum enforcement of Federal immigration law and redirecting available Federal, State, or local law enforcement resources to apprehend and deport illegal aliens in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area.”
Additionally, due to the increased presence of government officials enacting this executive order, many businesses have suffered losses in revenue and labor. Specific companies affected by increased ICE activity include restaurants, delivery companies and the hospitality industry. Whether workers have been deported or simply are fearful of showing up to work due to threats of ICE raids, companies’ loss of labor has led to many going out of business or merely suffering economic difficulties.