Charlotte business owner it’s still slow after Border Patrol operations

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — It’s been two months since U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents were in Charlotte and other North Carolina towns and cities, and a Charlotte laundromat owner says his business remains down. 

Weekends are the busiest time at North Tryon Laundromat, but owner David Rebolloso says even for a weekday things are slow right now.  

“We used to be very busy, but as you can see right now, there’s nobody in here,” Rebolloso said. “As you can see, the parking lot, it’s, it’s pretty much empty, but we get so busy that, people could not park in here.” 

It’s been two months since Customs and Border Patrol’s Charlotte’s Web Operation came through the city and right in front of Rebolloso’s business.  

Since then, his bottom line is still being impacted.

“It’s down half, at least 50%,” Rebolloso said. “I’m making the same amount with two locations what I used to make in one location now making a pretty much the same, but with two locations.”

He opened his first laundromat location nine years ago. 

CharlotteEAST, a nonprofit that serves the east side of Charlotte, says there are roughly 420 independently owned businesses in their area, and “nearly all were impacted in one way or another from CBP.”

In a survey with 90 responses, there was “an average daily loss of $2,500 in revenue.” 

They say no businesses in the area they serve shut down during the Border Patrol’s operations, but they estimate that nearly half closed temporarily. They say “business is slowly picking back up to pre-CBP pace but still lower than 2024.”  

Rebolloso says knowing customers that got picked up by Border Patrol and seeing what his community went through two months ago, things still aren’t the same. 

“I’m hoping that things will stabilize, and maybe it’ll pick up a little bit, you know, but it’ll never go back to the way things used to be,” Rebolloso said. 

He says he hates to be pessimistic, but calls what he sees happening sad.

“There’s optimism as an immigrant, as a migrant, there’s an optimism that things are going to get better if we work hard, you know, and if we strive and do what we’re supposed to do, life is going to get better. You know, the country’s getting better. We’re building the country, you know, and, and then we reached this point,” Rebolloso said.  

Rebolloso says he and many others in the Latino community keep up with Spanish news where they’re consistently updated with immigration stories across the country, like in Minneapolis.

“This young lady that was killed a few days ago, I don’t why. God works in mysterious ways. I think her name really is going to carry on for a very long time. Do good, be good. Do good, be good. That’s all we can do,” Rebolloso said. 

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