‘Solidarity’ with Utah’s immigrants prompts some businesses to shut down for a day

Shoppers looking for groceries at Rancho Market in Salt Lake City Monday found its North Temple parking lot vacant and the doors closed.

People hoping for coffee at several shops along the Wasatch Front also went away empty-handed. And a school in West Valley City found itself short-staffed, as teachers and other employees took the day off.

These places and workers were supporting a national “Day Without Immigrants” campaign — along with other businesses that stayed shut and posted on social media accounts that they were joining the protest for the day.

In West Valley City, Dancing Moose Montessori School sent a message to parents and students Sunday evening, warning them that “many of our teachers will be participating in ‘A Day Without Immigrants.’”

“We anticipate limited classroom coverage,” the message read. “We will be using all available resources to ensure that children receive care but there may be some new faces in classrooms.” The school offered a refund for Monday’s classes, to help parents who needed to make alternate arrangements for their children’s care.

Tania Granados, the school’s director, said in a separate message that more than 60% of the school’s staff are immigrants. “This movement holds deep personal significance for many of us,” Granados wrote.

Kim Chhour, a parent at the school, said she and her husband had to hurry to find someone to watch their children — but added that the movement is important.

“It’s hard,” Chhour said. “Because if your work isn’t able to be flexible with you to take the day off to care for your child, because there is potentially not enough staffing at the school, that can become an issue.”

Chhour — whose parents were refugees from Cambodia who came to Utah under the sponsorship of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — sent a message Sunday evening to Jodi Steere, the Montessori school’s regional director. In it, she wrote that “our family fully supports the Day Without Immigrants. … As a show of solidarity, we plan to keep our [daughters] home tomorrow.”

At Rancho Market, would-be customers found a flier, taped to the inside of the door, declaring that all nine of the chain’s markets in Utah, from Ogden to Provo, were closed Monday.

“Rancho Markets join this movement in support of our entire Latin community,” the flier read, in English and Spanish. “No school — no escuela. No spending — no comprar. No work — no trabajar.”

A message on Rancho Markets’ website said the chain was supporting the protest “due to the current federal political treatment of hard-working and law-abiding immigrants, who are being unfairly treated.”

Rancho Markets’ CEO, Eli Madrigal, said her company has received many comments from customers, “some appreciative, some angry.” She also said closing for the day, and supporting Rancho employees, came at a cost for the company.

But joining the protest was important, Madrigal said, because “every single one of us is an immigrant — whether we’re first-generation, second-generation or third-generation. We need to take care of each other.”

Immigrants, Madrigal said, are Rancho Markets’ customers and part of its community.

”We don’t want to cause a problem,” she said. “We just want to be respected and tell people we are here to work and make a difference. ... [We’re] not here to damage anything or make our own rules. We follow rules. We just want an opportunity to work and to live in this country.”

At least four area coffee shops closed for the day, according to their Instagram accounts. They ranged from Salt Lake City — Un Cafecito on North Temple and Luna Coffee and Crystals in the Ballpark neighborhood — to Azucar Cafe in West Valley City and Pueblo Coffee on Main in Springville.

Veronica Aldama, owner of the recently opened Luna Coffee, told The Salt Lake Tribune that “we really want to bring awareness to the importance of a diverse community and how much we contribute to this amazing country.”

Aldama, who immigrated to the United States from Mexico, said she worked for the last 10 years for “a corporation who profited from my community and never showed any support, and that didn’t fit with my values. Now that I have my own voice, I wanted to make it count.”

Cynthia Lemus, owner of Un Cafecito, said the response from her customers has been “overwhelmingly positive.” Many, she said, have shared the shop’s Instagram post announcing the one-day closure.

Lemus, whose parents are immigrants — her father is from Mexico, her mother is from Peru — said her shop was taking part in the protest “because we want to stand in solidarity with our immigrant neighbors, brothers and sisters, who are fighting for their voices to be heard.”

Jesus Ruiz, who opened Señor Pollo Mexican Grill in 2018, said the Sugar House and Taylorsville locations he owns were closed Monday “just in solidarity to the Hispanic community, because the community is scared of everything that’s happening with immigration at this time.” (Another Señor Pollo franchise, in Rose Park, also was closed Monday.)

Also among the businesses that closed Monday, according to their Instagram accounts, are: Cakes by Edith, a bakery in Taylorsville; El Morelense, a Mexican restaurant in South Jordan; El Paisa Grill, a Mexican restaurant with locations in West Valley City and Ogden; House of Corn, in downtown Salt Lake City; La Casa del Tamal, a Mexican restaurant in West Valley City; and Loco Burger and El Meños Mexican restaurant, both on 1700 South in Salt Lake City.

The Food Justice Coalition, a Utah nonprofit that works to fight food insecurity, posted on its Instagram account that it felt “compelled to stand in solidarity” with Latino businesses, and shut down operations for the day.

The Salt Lake City School District reported a rise in student absences Monday, with most schools missing between 30% to 50% of students, according to district spokesperson Yándary Chatwin. She said the absences were above normal and, in most cases, higher than the previous Monday.

There were no reports of higher-than-normal staff absences, she said.

“Salt Lake is one of very few districts in the state of Utah where most of the kids are from a racial or ethnic minority background,” Chatwin said. “That does not mean they’re all immigrants, and we don’t have any way to 100% identify whether the increase in absences today is due to the Day Without Immigrants. But I do think what this tells us is that immigrant families are an integral part of our capital city and our communities here.”

News reports showed businesses closed in California, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Oklahoma and the Washington, D.C., area as part of the protest.

Tribune business reporter Shannon Sollitt also contributed to this article.