The decision was  a close 5 to 4 vote. Chief Justice John J. Roberts was the swing vote and wrote the majority opinion.

“We do not decide whether DACA or its rescission are sound policies,” Chief Justice Roberts wrote. “We address only whether the agency complied with the procedural requirement that it provide a reasoned explanation for its action.”

The decision states the Trump Administration did not provide sufficient reasons to terminate the program. The administration did not follow the proper procedures required and did not thoroughly assess how the ending of DACA would affect those whore relied on it.

“Here the agency failed to consider the conspicuous issues of whether to retain forbearance and what if anything to do about the hardship to DACA recipients,” Roberts wrote. “That dual failure raises doubts about whether the agency appreciated the scope of its discretion or exercised that discretion in a reasonable manner.”

Along with  Roberts, the majority opinion included liberal justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor.

President Donald Trump tweeted his disfavor and urged the public to  reelect him.

These horrible & politically charged decisions coming out of the Supreme Court are shotgun blasts into the face of people that are proud to call themselves Republicans or Conservatives. We need more Justices or we will lose our 2nd. Amendment & everything else. Vote Trump 2020!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 18, 2020

Giovana Banuelos is a Dreamer and a student at California State University San Bernardino. She shared on twitter how relieved she was shortly after hearing DACA will continue.

I have been so anxious ever since this month started because of this big decision that was to be made. This could’ve changed my life forever and destroyed the future I have been working so hard on BUT WOW.. this was amazing news. GREAT WAY to start my day. I am in tears #DREAMER https://t.co/tZCAXwGelP

— Giovana Banuelos (@Banuelos_gio) June 18, 2020

DACA was first announced by former President Barack Obama in 2012. But in 2017 the Trump administration announced its plan to end it. The immigration policy allowed people who were brought to the United States as children to apply for temporary status. This status prevents deportation and grants permission to work for two years.  When it expires  it can be renewed by recipients. Former President Barack Obama also responded to the decisions via Twitter.

Eight years ago this week, we protected young people who were raised as part of our American family from deportation. Today, I’m happy for them, their families, and all of us. We may look different and come from everywhere, but what makes us American are our shared ideals…

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) June 18, 2020

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While the SEBIN officers were waiting for the family to arrive, they ravaged their apartment in Caracas, going through all their belongings. After that call, the Sosa family had to leave everything behind and plan their escape. They were able to cross the border to Colombia by car, and from there they flew to Florida to apply for political asylum. After a series of odd jobs, Sosa finally found a job related to her engineering degree in New York. Her first day at the job was Monday, March 9. On Friday, March 13, the office closed and the city went on lockdown.  

“The first day in the job I cried because I couldn’t believe where I was,” Sosa said referring to the Major League Baseball office building at the Rockefeller center. “But I literally started on a Monday, and Friday of that same week the office closed because of the coronavirus. [In the office] it felt as if it had been 9/11, all the games were being cancelled, it was horrible.” 

 Venezuelans who have migrated to New York in the past two or three years have had to confront two crises in a short time frame. They left their country to flee rampant crime, hyperinflation, food scarcity, and social and political instability only to find the U.S. is plagued by its own set of issues, such as social inequality, racial disparity and police brutality, all of which are more evident in New York and the COVID-19 outbreak has exacerbated. 

Niurka Melendez, founder of Venezuelans and Immigrants Aid (VIA), a non-profit organization for Venezuelans in New York, did not receive the $1,200 stimulus check as a Venezuelan asylum seeker.

“Venezuelans are seeing themselves left without nothing again, and I say again because starting from ground zero is not something new for them,” Melendez said. “After achieving some degree of financial stability they are stripped from it once more.” 

Sosa and her family applied for political asylum because her mom was accused of participating in a drone attack against President Nicolas Maduro during a 2018 military ceremony in Caracas. Sosa said her mom had been helping student protesters who were struggling because of the country’s political turmoil. She collected food and clothing for them, and helped them find shelter. When the drone attack took place, Maduro’s government conducted arbitrary arrests, which included some of the students Sosa’s mother had been helping.

The SEBIN took their cellphones and saw WhatsApp messages from Sosa’s mother offering the students assistance. She was immediately implicated in the drone attacks, and currently there is an extradition request from Venezuela’s Supreme Court of Sosa’s mother. 

“The neighbor told us the SEBIN was at our apartment and there was no way we could go back,” Sosa said. “We never returned, all we know from our neighbor is that they waited for us for hours while drinking our whiskey, wine and all the food in our fridge. They stole our TVs, our clothing, jewelry, our legal documents and left the apartment completely empty.” 

 Despite direct prosecution of the Sosa family from the Maduro government, Sosa is currently waiting for her political asylum application to be approved by the U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services, (USCIS) a process that usually takes years and could be further delayed due to COVID-19. According to the USCIS website, the New York asylum office will be closed indefinitely.

 The broken diplomatic ties between the U.S. and Venezuela have restricted Venezuelans’ access to consular services. Also, many of the Venezuelans who have recently migrated find themselves in a legal limbo when arriving in the U.S. Hence, they do not have support from the country they left behind and they do not have support from the country they migrated to. This issue has become more evident during the pandemic. 

Ana Garcia, 19, arrived in New York in September of last year because she was awarded a scholarship to study performing arts in the New York Film Academy. Typically, international students arrive in the U.S. with a student visa already approved in their home countries. But since the U.S. embassy in Caracas is closed, Garcia had to enter the U.S. with a tourist visa and had to apply for a student visa once she was in New York. 

While she awaited a response from USCIS, she did a Google search for “Venezuelan restaurants near me,” and walked into several of them to ask if they were hiring. One of them was, and she worked as a server there until the restaurant closed due to the city-wide lockdown. After the outbreak started, USCIS canceled the interview they had scheduled with her to approve her student visa without a new date. She requested her name to be changed as she fears this information could affect her student visa approval.

 Garcia had to move out of New York to stay with a friend in North Carolina to cut costs. Without a job and without being eligible for economic assistance from the U.S. government, a New York rent was impossible to pay. 

“It’s like going from one hell to another,” she said. “Just when I feel like I have achieved a better life, the [pandemic] happens. It hit New York so hard and it was really difficult for me, especially as an immigrant. I don’t have the same rights an American has. I’ve had to figure out everything on my own. I’m only 19, I’m not a grown woman with her life figured out, so it’s really hard.”  

Melendez said there are still many paradigms with the Venezuelan migration.

“Countries still haven’t recognized Venezuelans as refugees. When Cubans arrive in Miami they obtain legal status, but not Venezuelans,” she said.  “Even though it is a forced migration due to the humanitarian crisis, the U.S. doesn’t recognize it as such. What [VIA] has seen during these 12 weeks of quarantine in New York is that, due to their irregular legal status, Venezuelans can only count on the support from churches, or an organization like [ours], or the International Rescue Committee.”

She added that she does not expect any support from the Venezuelan government for COVID-19 because of the longstanding lack of consular services. 

 Garcia has to return to New York eventually because she started all her migration paperwork in the USCIS office there. She is deciding whether to delay her start at the New York Film Academy a year, or until she knows for certain she will be able to attend classes in person. She cannot return to her home in Caracas because of her pending visa appointment. Garcia is counting only on the support of Venezuelan friends she has made since her arrival in the city. One of the most difficult things for her is not being able to be with her family. 

“In Venezuela you have your home, you have your family.  Even though it is horrible there, you have your own roof,” she said.

Since Sosa’s arrival in the U.S., all the jobs she has landed have been through her own search or through word of mouth, and she does not know of any organizations that help Venezuelans integrate to their new communities. She was able to maintain her engineering position and is currently working remotely from New York, but her weekly hours were reduced. For her, the social and political unrest brought by COVID-19 and the police murder of George Floyd are reminiscent of the ongoing protests in Caracas demanding reform and justice from the government. She is used to the social and political unrest that has followed her all the way to the U.S., but she is not used to being far away from her family, who is currently in Miami.

“Even though sometimes we wouldn’t have electricity or running water, I had a stable life [in Caracas] so I feel like I’ve been ripped from my nucleus,” she said. “This pandemic is killing me because of the anxiety of being alone.” 

If Maduro were to rescind, the Sosa family would return to Venezuela in a heartbeat. But as long as his administration is in power, they do not have that option.

“We couldn’t even leave the country by plane,” Sosa said. “We are literally exiled, we can’t return to Venezuela. If that wasn’t the case, I would be there.”

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 “It would be wrong and unjust for Americans laid off by the virus to be replaced by new immigrant labor flown in from abroad,” Trump said during today’s press briefing. “We must first take care of the American worker.”  

With immigration being the strawman of the Trump presidency, the abrupt announcement comes as his administration faces growing criticism over its handling of the coronavirus outbreak. 

 The executive order would remain in effect for 60 days, and after that, the need for an “extension or modification” to the original order would be evaluated by Trump and an unnamed group of people.

 “This order will only apply to individuals seeking permanent residency,” said Trump. “It will not apply to those entering on a temporary basis.”

 Although there is currently no evidence to back that immigration would be taxing on the reopening of the United States, Trump claimed that the restrictions are not only to protect American workers, but also to conserve medical supplies for American citizens. 

Trump anticipates signing the order by tonight.

 FDA officials have approved a “highly accurate” at-home version of the coronavirus test, according to Trump. Labcorp, the company behind the new self-testing kits, plans to make them available with a doctor’s orders for most states in the coming weeks.

 In addition to the at-home test, the United States will begin implementing antibody tests, which can detect if someone has contracted and subsequently beat the virus.

 Earlier today, President Trump and Gov. Andrew Cuomo met at the White House to discuss virus testing and how to boost its volume in New York.

 Following the meeting, Cuomo told MSNBC via telephone interview, “The meeting went well, and I think it was productive. The big issue was testing.”

Trump said Cuomo indicated that the USNS Comfort was no longer required in New York and would be able to deploy to other states in need.

 “We will be bringing the ship back at its earliest time,” said Trump. “We’ll be getting it ready for its next mission.”

 The meeting follows a heated back and forth between the governor and president as tensions between the pair have escalated as the pandemic grows  Recently, after requesting more ventilators and other medical supplies, Trump accused Cuomo of magnifying the need for more aid in New York, the world’s epicenter for coronavirus cases. Cuomo fired back at Trump to “stop watching TV and get back to work.”

 Since then, Trump has changed his tune. At a press conference on Monday, after discussing the coordination of COVID-19 testing at 300 labs in New York, Trump said, “They are getting it together in New York. A lot of good things are happening in New York.” 

 Trump repeated his praise, claiming that he is “proud” of the relationship between his administration and New York.  

 Trump’s statement and optimism are in stark contrast to the feelings of Mayor Bill de Blasio, who told CNN on Tuesday, “We’re fighting the battle still on the ground, and you have people in Washington acting like it’s all over. It’s not over!” 

 Prior to departing to Washington D.C. for the White House  meeting, Cuomo held a briefing in Buffalo, New York. Cuomo reported 481 coronavirus-related deaths, a slight increase from just the day before when 478 deaths were tallied. In total, New York now has reported 14,828 coronavirus-related deaths across the state.

Cuomo has now decided to accept a regional approach that will allow part of New York State to reopen to get the economy moving again, at least in some places. The approach looks at data that tracks the number of cases, hospitalization rates and other elements to determine if reopening is safe in that area. Yesterday he said he favored a statewide approach. 

 “We operate as one state but we also have to understand variations, and you do want to get this economy open as soon as possible,” said Cuomo.  

 As New York extends its shutdown to May 15, other states are beginning to lift restrictions that were set in place to flatten the curve of COVID-19. South Carolina, Georgia, Ohio and Tennessee are to begin reopening this week. 

 In Georgia, gyms, barbershops, salons and tattoo studios will be back in business by Friday, April 24. Georgians will be able to go to restaurants and movie theaters by Monday, April 28. 

 For Tennessee, restrictions will not surpass April 30, allowing the “majority of businesses in 89 counties” to reopen, Gov. Bill Lee’s office told the New York Times. Following suit, Ohio will reopen May 1 as well. 

 In South Carolina, businesses deemed nonessential, such as retail stores, will be allowed to open up shop but must follow social distancing orders. Beaches will also open to the public today. 

 The openings come after a series of protests reflecting the growing frustrations of people fed up with the shutdown restrictions and unable to sustain themselves without continuing to work. 

 In economic news, the effects of the coronavirus have hit the United States oil industry, lowering the price of crude oil to negative $37.65 below zero. 

 The price does not reflect the cost of a physical oil-filled barrel, but rather the futures contracts between buyers and sellers. Futures contracts are what the oil industry uses to dictate pricing, as they outline agreements of supply and demand for the months to come. With people flying and driving at far less scale, the need for refined oil has diminished. And since oil refineries have been slow to halt production, a surplus has built up not allowing the market to refresh, thus lowering the market price. 

 In an industry suffering less during the COVID-19 pandemic, New York-based fast-food chain Shake Shack is returning a $10 million government loan it received meant for small businesses. According to Shake Shack founders and board members, the company gained access to additional capital and is returning it so it can be given to businesses who need it more. In a joint statement posted on LinkedIn by Shake Shack founder Danny Meyer and CEO Randy Garutti wrote, “Until every restaurant that needs it has had the same opportunity to receive assistance, we’re returning ours.”

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Protestors held a brief vigil for Mariee Juarez in front of JPMorgan’s headquarters in Midtown Manhattan. She died after being released from an immigration detention center in Dilley, Texas. Photo by Caroline Aguirre

A group of about 30 protesters stood in front of JPMorgan Chase headquarters yesterday in Midtown Manhattan, mourning the death of a Guatemalan toddler that got sick in an immigration detention center. They protested the bank’s role in funding these facilities.

“Standing here as a mother and being in front of a picture of a young girl that just passed away – I feel very affected by this,” said Edith Calderon, of National Domestic Workers Alliance. “You can’t find the words.”

The protesters joined together to speak out against JPMorgan Chase’s involvement in funding detention centers, which they believe is fueling the separation of families. They delivered signed petitions, urging the bank to stop lending money to CoreCivic and Geo Group – two of America’s largest for-profit prison corporations.

A report by the Center for Popular Democracy shows that JPMorgan is the single largest lender of these corporations. They loaned a total of $167.5 million as of March 2018.

The Guatemalan toddler Mariee Juarez and her mother , Yazmin, 20, stayed in a Dilley, Texas detention center run by CoreCivic and funded by JPMorgan Chase. Her mother has filed multiple lawsuits seeking $40 million in damages.

“This is the human face of the crisis that this bank is financing,” said protestor Marilyn Mendoza.

Three months ago the group protested in front of the home of JP Morgan Chase’s CEO Jamie Dimon.

“Now we stand outside his office because one of those children has died,” said Yaritza Mendez.

Ironically, Dimon has spoken out against Trump’s policy of separating children from their families.

A CNBC article states that Dimon referred employees to a statement by Business Roundtable which called separating children from their parents a “cruel” practice that’s “contrary to American values.”

But JP Morgan Chase still funds these prisons.

Ricardo Aca, a DACA recipient, said Dimon is not hearing them.

“We were putting our bodies on the line – organizers and community leaders,” Aca said. “We want to send this message and want him to listen to us.”

JPMorgan Chase had no comment regarding the protest at its headquarters.

Protester Timothy Lunceford said he is looking for other banks that do not support the separation of children.

“Now that I know banks support separation of children, I’m looking,” Lunceford said. “The U.S. government supports this as a punishment, and children shouldn’t be punished.”

Protester and mother Khadija Gurnah said children are placed in unsafe conditions when moved to detention centers.

“I get the privilege of tucking my children into bed every single night,” said Gurnah.

“The 13,000 children being held right now in detention should have that opportunity to be home and safe.”

Ann Toback believes that the Trump administration has supported bigoted policies.  

“As Jews, we are horrified to watch terrible history repeating itself,” Toback said. “The past two years we have witnessed Trump and his administration motivate and encourage bigoted people across the country.”

She believes America is closing its borders to helpless people, and JPMorgan is only forwarding Trump’s agenda.

“There are institutional backbones to these policies of hate,” she said. “The JPMorgan’s of the world – a civilized public face, even as they finance CoreCivic and Geo Groups without a care for the human misery resulting from their actions.”

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 La Morada is a restaurant that multitasks. From the kitchen, flautas, enchiladas, mole, tacos are served up. In their dining room, the tables double as a community space, where the words “No Mas Deportaciones” and “Black Lives Mattered” are painted on doors and corners, where a flyer saying “Vote” and “Resist” is plastered repeatedly on the Mott, Haven, Bronx entryway.  

Last night it served as the venue for the Bronx Museum’s second installment  of their Bronx Speaks series, a program that combines art and social justice. Neighborhood women,street vendors, chefs, activists, teamed up with art collectives to trace their journeys to Mott Haven, their home. Throughout the night speakers took turn sharing what the community of Mott Haven meant to them. For the outsiders, from the art collectives, it was an opportunity to share why they became involved.

Yajaira Saavedra, the daughter of the owner of La Morada is one of those women who needed space to express her fear and frustration at the way her neighborhood is changing.  “As an undocumented immigrant, I can’t rely on the NYPD,” Saavedra said, her voice shaking. “I felt safer when they weren’t everywhere. I feel safer when it is just my community.”

She spoke at length about the need to fight back against the gentrification in the neighborhood, that an increased police presence was a danger to a largely black and brown community, to a community of immigrants, street vendors, and working class people.

Yajaira anecdotes are reflective of the neighborhood’s statistics: Mott Haven is 72 percent hispanic, and 25 percent black. Of the 94,000 residents in the neighborhood, 36 percent have a limited proficiency in English. Mott Haven has the highest percentage of adults who have not completed high school in all of New York City and 46 percent of the district lives below the federal poverty level. The neighborhood has the highest rate for child asthma in the whole city,  nearly three times the city average.

Her sister, Carolina Saavedra, the su chef of the restaurant, learned to cook in Mexico, at the Oaxaca Culinary Institute. Carolina was first in the first speaker in the series. Upon returning to the United States, she was dismayed to realize that her Mexican cooking experience wasn’t good enough for most restaurants. She looked around and saw the food of her culture, the precious mole which once used to be considered a gift to the gods, offered up in knock off restaurants for twice the price.

The art that Carolina made was for her children, and for the children she watched grow up in the neighborhood. She recreated “The Hungry Caterpillar” for the kids, and the culture she knew. The caterpillar munched on guacamole and rice and beans, not candy or sandwiches.

As she read her story, Carolina broke down in tears. So did many others who presented their art that night. A woman named Eutiquia Herrera, who sold coco helado immigrated to the U.S. from a poor, small village in Mexico. Juana Tapia, who learned to make her mother’s perfect mole sauce because she missed her so much, but could not return to Mexico – the mole was her only connection to home. Carmela, who made her art to smell like the flowers she misses in Mexico, and that she grows in the Mott Haven community garden.

David Keef, a war veteran and program director of the Frontline Arts group, used papermaking as a way to deal with his traumas – he taught the method to the women of Mott Haven, hoping to make a connection to the community and learn more about people different from him.

“As a veteran myself, I feel somewhat responsible and I feel guilt for the systemic racism, the nationalism and colonialism that America perpetrates,” Keef said into the crowded dining room. “I feel deeply betrayed by my country. A country that strips people of innocence and culture, a country that dehumanizes an entire population”

The betrayal Keef feels, one he tied to mass incarceration, increased deportations, and the criminalization of the poor – an average Mott Haven resident might have an experience with any, or all three, scenarios – Mott Haven has one of the highest incarceration rates in the city, nearly double the average for the Bronx.

For Keef, working with communities like Mott Haven was a way to teach his form of storytelling, one through art, to other people who would benefit from telling their stories. Mott Haven, which was recently almost renamed the Piano District in an effort to gentrify the area, is suffering from rising rents and increased costs at local retailers, a way to share personal experiences in a community setting was a needed catharsis.

Each woman could not separate the importance of their home, their community in Mott Haven, from the feelings of safety and happiness felt in their lives. All feared what gentrification and over policing could do to a community connected by street vendors.

“Who’s going to know us? Who’s going to see us? Who will we talk to?” Carolina Saavedra asked, while clutching the art that featured vignettes of her life.

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Monica Sibri is a Dreamer who isn’t protected by DACA. Not because she didn’t apply or because she was “lazy,” as members of the current administration have stated, but because she came to the U.S. from Ecuador three months after her 16th birthday, making her ineligible for the program.

The term “Dreamer” originally came from the DREAM Act, which was a legislation proposed by representatives of both parties. In 2012, Barack Obama’s enactment of DACA was a compromise based on the proposals of the act and they, too, called themselves “Dreamers.” Young people like Sibri, although not protected by DACA, have used the word as a way to empower themselves.

“The way someone reacts to you when you say you’re a ‘Dreamer’ than when you’re undocumented is completely different,” Sibri, 25, said.”By saying that you’re undocumented, it assumes that you’re not in school or you’re this person who’s working in cleaning or you likely crossed the border, but when you say you’re a ‘Dreamer,’ people assume differently.”

According to the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank that studies global immigration patterns, an estimated 3.6 million people were brought to the U.S. before their 18th birthdays, making the focus on the almost 800,000 DACA recipients seem like an overlook of the larger issue of child immigration.

Sibri’s father decided to uproot their family when Ecuador’s currency changed in 2000 from the Ecuadorian Sucre to the U.S. Dollar, and he lost his managerial position at a candle company.

Her parents came to the U.S. to establish a life in Staten Island, separating the family for five years.
“I became an adult really young,” Sibri said. “I had to take care of my two younger sisters.”

When she learned she was undocumented and about the negativity surrounding it, she started calling herself a “Dreamer.” Sibri said that this helped her to confidently pursue higher education at the College of Staten Island where she graduated last year with a degree in American politics, policy and advocacy.

Since the law does not require one to disclose their immigration status, especially in educational facilities, Sibri maintained this persona, but never received any actual funds or special resources because of it. She explained that it created a shield against the stereotypes placed on undocumented individuals.

“My passion for creating a network of support begun with talking about the barriers I experienced myself. In college, I was often questioned about my immigration status and when letting them know that I was undocumented I got concerned looks, followed by a list of questions as to how I was in school,” Sibri said. “When talking about this, I learned through speaking to the network that this was happening in all spaces, from the school’s scholarship to the academic department, from the registration office to the office of financial aid, from the classroom to the soccer field.”

Sibri’s solution to this was to create the City University of New York  Dreamers, an organization for those with protected and unprotected status in the college system. Today, she serves on the advisory board for the program and has gone on to help initiate a larger group for “Dreamers” after she graduated from college and realized the same resources weren’t set up to foster undocumented individuals after graduation.

“DACA recipients often assume that I am a DACA recipient because of my work, and often when they learned of my status, they share tears with me,” Sibri said. “We just cry together.”

She said that she knows other undocumented students who have adopted the identity “dreamer” or assumed the societal benefits of a DACA recipient, but that it becomes much more complex upon graduating from higher education.

“(Post-grad), undocumented students begin to realize there are some things they have to navigate around and that there are potential barriers to achieving their dreams,” said Cristina Velez, staff attorney for the Immigration Defense Fund at New York University.

Sibri has been pushing against that narrative through her work at a nonprofit called Ignite, which aims to empower college-aged women to become active in their community and eventually run for office.

“I thought to myself, I’m undocumented, I might be in the process of getting deported. What do I do in the meantime?” Sibri said. “Democrats and Republicans in office are not representing me so I have to train the next generation to represent their communities like they’re supposed to.”

Now, Sibri and the more than 11 million undocumented individuals in the U.S. have nothing to do but wait — wait to see if a clean DREAM Act is passed or if they have to bargain a possible road to citizenship and protected status with Republican efforts to get a border wall and an end to “chain migration.”

“I think there is a glimmer of hope right now that if DREAM Act does pass then some (undocumented individuals) would finally have some opportunity to work in the United States and to have status,” Velez said. “For them, probably seeing the benefits of DACA for their peers must be very destructive and difficult at times. And I’m sure it would be even more of a blow if the DREAM Act did not come to pass.”

For Sibri, it will be more than a blow. She is part of what she calls a “mixed-status” family; her younger brother is a U.S. citizen while the rest of her family is undocumented. As the March 5 deadline approaches for congressional agreement on the future of “Dreamers” and consequently undocumented individuals alike, Sibri and her family are at peril of being separated once again. Deportation has become more of a reality for undocumented individuals than ever before. Sibri, said she constantly lives in fear of deportation and options may be running out.

“As much as I would love to continue fighting, my timeline in New York is dependent on us getting some sort of legislation in the next five years. If not, I will have to self-deport,” Sibri said, referring to undocumented individuals leaving a country where they could face deportation before ICE reaches them. “What else can I do? We are living day by day without being able to look ahead.”

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Not every African immigrant is upset over Trump calling their homeland a “shithole.” At Dred Barbershop and Salon in the South Bronx, some believe he was right on target.

“Trump is 200 percent right. Some parts of Africa are a shithole,” said Ghanaian immigrant Mohammed Ali Akirugu, 34, a regular customer at the barbershop. “The way he said it was not right, but what he said was right.”

President Trump’s comments were allegedly made during a bipartisan meeting with senators in the oval office where, they discussed a deal to protect America’s borders and immigrants from Haiti, El Salvador and African countries who are on temporary protection status (TPS).

Akirugu, a Ghanaian immigrant and regular customer at the barbershop said the economy back home made it difficult for him and now his younger brother, who recently graduated with a political science degree from the Islamic University College, Ghana, to find work.

“We video chat every day and nothing has changed since I left,” he said. “If you don’t have political connections somewhere you can’t get a job, that’s a shithole.”

According to a 2012 study released by africaneconomicoutlook.org, Ghanaian youths make up an estimated 33 percent of the population. Youths between ages 15-24 have an unemployment rate of 25.6 percent, twice that of those between the age of 25-44 and three times that of those 45-64.

Solomon Oolong, a Ghanaian immigrant patiently waits for his barber to prep him for his haircut and shave at Dred Barbershop in the South Bronx. Photo by: Keziah Tutu

Solomon Oolong, 27, a Ghanaian immigrant who emigrated to the United States two months ago, shared the experience of his inability to find work after graduating in 2012 with a degree in Business Administration from Valley View University in the Greater Accra region of Ghana.

“I literally begged for work to do, but everywhere I went, there were no openings,” he said. “We have all the resources in Ghana, but our leaders won’t help us so we end up living in hell.”

Oolong supported himself by opening an internet cafe with money he earned from his National Service at a military hospital in Accra, Ghana’s capital city. National Service is temporary paid labor all graduates of accredited Ghanaian institutions are required to perform for a year to the nation.

“Some of my mates who I graduated with came to me for work,” he said. I couldn’t believe it. These guys were graduates.”

Oolong said he does not find President Trump’s comments as an insult or an attack on his identity as an African man.

“Trumps comments don’t affect me because he doesn’t know me personally,” he said. “He’s speaking to our leaders. It’s a wakeup call for them.”

Kofi Addison, a 35-year-old barber who has worked at the shop for 11 years, also expressed his support for President Trump’s comments.

“I love my county, I love Ghana but the politicians there only enrich themselves,” he said. “My job is to work hard, improve myself and hope my people back home change their mindsets.”

Germain Ouedraog, 25, a college student from Cote D’ivoire, was among the few who expressed their anger towards the president’s comments.

“What he said was not right,” he said. “He should think about the past, the United States would not be this great nation without Africans.”

Ouedraog came to the United states on a student visa, with the hopes of completing his college education and finding a better job to support his family back home.

“I’m paying my taxes to this country, not to Africa,” he said. “If I come from a shithole country, it is my tax money that aids development here.”

He said the president should show more respect to the immigrant community and the leaders of African nations should invest their resources in their people and nation.

“It is time to think of ourselves and stop depending on others,” he said. “If Africans would unite and start fighting for ourselves, maybe Trump would see how great we really are.”

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