This summary was featured in Documented’s Early Arrival newsletter. You can subscribe to receive it in your inbox three times per week here.
People rallied Saturday in Passaic City Hall in New Jersey to call on the state legislature to provide relief funds for immigrants. Gov. Phil Murphy (D) unveiled the state’s budget on Tuesday, and it included no coronavirus relief money for immigrants. Make the Road New Jersey organized the rally to demand that help, especially since immigrants were also left out of federal government pandemic stimulus packages. It is calling for the passage of bill S2480, would provide one-time payments to undocumented and eligible taxpayers. According to the bill, undocumented New Jersey state residents pay $1.1 billion in federal taxes and $600 million in state and local taxes. NorthJersey.com
In other local immigration news…
Some Immigrant Businesses Survive Pandemic, While Others Shutter
Some of New York City’s iconic immigrant-run businesses are weathering the pandemic, just as their families have for generations through the city’s ups and downs. Places such as Steinway Pianos in Queens, Rao’s restaurant in East Harlem, Egidio’s Pastry Shop in the Bronx, the Wonder Wheel on Coney Island and Sahadi’s supermarkets in Brooklyn are enduring despite the economic headwinds the pandemic brought about. Still, Sun’s Laundry, a Stuy-Town Chinese hand laundry business, is shuttering after 60 years due to the pandemic. Its 84-year-old owner Robert Lee had been considering shutting down the shop, but the coronavirus accelerated his decision. New York Daily News, Gothamist
Interactive Details History of Jackson Heights Plaza
New York City is slowly reopening, but it has still been hard to get government-issued identification, applicants say. IDNYC offices that closed in March have not reopened and DMV appointments are hard to come by. For immigrants, the inability to obtain legal forms of ID opens up fears of interacting with local authorities, especially because the undocumented became newly eligible for driver’s licenses this year. “Any interactions with the NYPD, for example, or when you go into a hospital, when you are trying to enroll your kids in school, you are going to need an ID and all of those are critical especially in this moment during a pandemic,” said Anu Joshi, vice president of policy for the New York Immigration Coalition. THE CITY
NY Universities Have Highest Number of International Students
New York University and Columbia University had the highest number of international students on F-1 visas in 2019, according to new data released by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. According to ICE’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program report, there were 19,750 foreign students enrolled at NYU and 19,741 enrolled at Columbia. California accounts for the largest portion of students from abroad, at 28.3%. The total number of active international students fell 1.7% in 2019 from the year before, continuing a trend that has persisted throughout the Trump administration. ICE 2019 SEVIS by the Numbers Report