ICE shut down this Latino market — without even showing up
NORTH LAS VEGAS, Nev. — On a typical weekend, 20,000 people stream through the metal gates at Broadacres Marketplace, thronging the aisles of the outdoor "swap meet" to hunt for the best deals, savor snacks and sip micheladas under the desert sky. Until late June, Broadacres' familiar bustle had cemented its place as the heart of this city's Latino community. That has been replaced with an eerie quiet. Hundreds of booths stand barren behind a chain-link fence, mostly stripped to their skeletal remains and covered in fabric or tarp. Save for one security guard at the main gate, there's no one in sight. Broadacres Marketplace announced that it would temporarily close on June 21 because of the threat of raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In a statement online, the market's management said the decision to close was made "out of an abundance of caution and concern for our community." Broadacres' owner, Greg Danz, is president and CEO of Newport Diversified Inc., a company that also owns two other swap meets in California. "We don't want any of our customers, vendors, or employees to be detained at our business or for us to be a beacon of shopping and entertainment while our federal government is raiding businesses and detaining its people," the statement read, adding that management does not yet have a planned date to reopen. Over the past six months, the Trump administration has implemented aggressive immigration policies and enforcement, detaining anddeporting tens of thousands of peoplesince it took office. The mass deportation efforts have sparked protests nationwide and laid bare how devastating the arrests — and the fear of them — are in cities across the country. After Donald Trump campaigned on the promise to deport swaths of violent criminals, a small fraction of undocumented immigrants in ICE custody are known violent actors. Half of those in detention have neither been convicted nor charged with a crime,according to ICE data. Latinos, in particular, have been a prime target, heightening fears in the community, including among those who have legal status. The only other time in its nearly 50-year history that the swap meet closed for an extended time was for a few months in 2020 during the pandemic, according to two longtime vendors. Rico Ocampo, whose family has been selling goods at Broadacres for more than 20 years, said his parents financially rely on the swap meet. "As a family, we're facing questions like: What are we going to do about the mortgage payment, with groceries? How are we going to recover from this?" he said. Ocampo, 34,said other vendors are most likely facing the same anxieties, while also managing real fears that they or their loved ones could get swept up in ICE raids. Earlier in June, ICE made arrests at the Santa Fe Spring Swap Meet in Southern California, which is under the same ownership as Broadacres,according to NBC Los Angeles. That has created fears that something similar could play out in Nevada. ICE and DHS have not responded to NBC News' requests for comment on the flea market raids. "When you hurt local businesses, you hurt the local community," Ocampo said. "When people are afraid to go to work or participate in daily life or share in community spaces like Broadacres, the whole community feels it. It's not just undocumented people; it's their children, their families, the customers who rely on those businesses to purchase items." Assemblymember Cecilia González, D-Las Vegas, who is chair of the Nevada Latino Legislative Caucus, called the Broadacres closure a "huge disruption." "It's an economic emergency for hundreds of entrepreneurs — immigrant and nonimmigrant," she said, adding that it is happening as the area is also dealing with the rising cost of living and one of the highest unemployment rates in the country. Las Vegas isn't alone in grappling with these tensions. Most major cities with big immigrant populations are facing similar issues, including in Houston, Los Angeles, Chicago and Miami. Broadacres Marketplace opened in 1977 and over the years has evolved from a small weekend flea market into a sprawling hub of shopping, food and live entertainment. The swap meet and its vast parking lot now cover more than 40 acres of land in suburban North Las Vegas. Open Friday through Sunday, Broadacres is a staple in the Latino community, but its popularity extends across the Las Vegas Valley. Of the nearly 2.4 million people who live in Clark County, which includes the cities of Las Vegas and North Las Vegas, 32.1% identify as Hispanic or Latino, according to2024 data from the U.S. Census Bureau. "It doesn't matter the color of your skin, it doesn't matter what nationality you are, it doesn't matter how old you are, there's something for you," said Jessica Vasquez, an artist, photographer and activist who grew up in Las Vegas and has been frequenting Broadacres for more than 40 years. Justin Favela, a 38-year-old artist who was born and raised in Las Vegas, has also been shopping at Broadacres since the 1980s. He said that throughout its history, the swap meet was a place where members of the Latino community felt safe and comfortable. It was also one of the only spots in the Las Vegas area where people could find items from their birth countries. "Back in the day in Las Vegas, it was really hard to get fresh coconuts or banana leaves or certain fruits and vegetables," Favela said. "Whenever it was holiday times, I remember, we would go and stock up on things that my mom couldn't get at the regular grocery store." As an adult, Favela said, he has been going to Broadacres at least once a month and was most recently there the night before the closure was announced. He recalled feeling something was amiss that Friday evening. Crowds in recent weeks had already been noticeably thinner, Favela said, particularly after the raid at the Santa Fe Springs Swap Meet. "First of all, it was easy to find parking, which is never the case," Favela said. "Then when I went in, it was maybe a quarter of the people who are usually there. And there was no live music. I knew something was way off." Ocampo said he and his family were painfully aware of ICE activity around the country, but the decision to close Broadacres still caught them off-guard. Vendors were not given notice, with staff members allegedly going booth to booth the morning of June 21 to inform people that the market would be closing that day. Broadacres management did not respond to requests for comment.. "I received a text message from family that morning at around 10 a.m. saying Broadacres was going to close," Ocampo said. "I thought the worst. I was thinking: Is there an ICE raid happening? What is going on?" Ocampo's parents, who spoke on the condition of anonymity and did not want to publicly disclose their immigration statuses for fear of reprisals, said the images from the California raid hit close to home. The family has lived in the U.S. since 1992. Now, though, in addition to concerns about discrimination and aggressive immigration enforcement, their financial future hangs in the balance. Translating his father's Spanish, Ocampo said not much remains of his parents' booth at Broadacres, where for more than two decades they sold peanuts, pumpkin seeds and various other dry goods. What started as a small peanut stand grew into multiple booths at the swap meet, offering roughly 50 items. One pound of peanuts sold for $3, two pounds for $5, he said. A small wheel of dry cheese marinated in a spicy rub fetched $25, while a larger one sold for $40. His bestseller? A type of squash seed known as semilla pipianera that can be eaten raw or roasted, or ground up to make a green mole. For now, Ocampo's parents are doing what they can to sell their products out of their home. A social media post after the Broadacres closure drummed up some support and sent more than 100 customers to the residence in one day. But relying on social media and word of mouth is unsustainable long term, Ocampo said. Many of his father's ingredients are imported from other states or countries, and he is forced to buy them in large quantities. In the back of the property, a temperature-controlled storage room houses pallets stacked with dozens of 50-pound bags of raw peanuts purchased from Texas. In another corner, giant sacks of pumpkin seeds from Bulgaria are kept dry, ready to be toasted for customers. Baggies of boiled peanuts are kept in an industrial fridge — Ocampo's father said those will be first to go to waste if Broadacres remains closed. The possibility that the swap meet could stay closed indefinitely is devastating, Ocampo said. "It has left their business, and other immigrant vendors and small-business owners, without the critical income that they need to survive during the busiest sales period," he said. Beyond adding financial instability, González, the assemblymember, said the Trump administration's immigration policies have used fear to destabilize Latino communities throughout the state. "Nevada has one of the largest numbers of mixed-status families per capita in the entire country," she said. "Many of us know people personally or have family members who have different types of statuses." González has been vocal in her support for the Broadacres vendors, but for elected officials like her, those statements have come at a price. State Sen. Fabian Doñate, a Democrat whose district includes the Las Vegas Strip, faced major backlash after he engaged in a heated back-and-forth with members of Nevada's Republican Party. The state GOP said June 23on Xabout the Broadacres closure: "If you can't stay open without illegal aliens, you don't deserve to be open at all." When Doñate responded that Republicans were being "anti-business" and "anti-economic development," theGOP accused himof admitting to having family members who are illegal immigrants, tagging the accounts for ICE, the Department of Homeland Security and its secretary, Kristi Noem, and FBI Director Kash Patel. "They are trying to distract from the economic crisis that our state is experiencing, and they're not offering solutions," Doñate said last week of the GOP reaction. "Instead, they made a personal and direct attack against me and my family." With no indication of whether, or when, the swap meet will reopen, Ocampo said Broadacres management and local lawmakers could do more to protect vendors and the greater community. "We want elected officials — especially the ones that represent immigrant communities — to step up to the plate," Ocampo said. "I want elected officials to show up for my mother and my father and give us more than tweets, give us more than sentiments or media advisories, because what's happening right now is a threat to Nevada's values, our economy and our families." Vasquez, the artist and activist who grew up in Las Vegas, said she remains hopeful that the community will bounce back.
ICE shut down this Latino market — without even showing up NORTH LAS VEGAS, Nev. — On a typical weekend, 20,000 people stream through the me...
