Ecuadorians fleeing violence and economic distress seek a new start in Minnesota

This story comes to you from Sahan Journal through a partnership with MPR News.

As Diego Guaman walked around Powderhorn Park last summer, what he saw moved him to tears. Members of the Ecuadorian community were playing soccer at the park while vendors were selling familiar street food.

“It was like, now I’m back home,” Guaman said.

Since then, Guaman, an advocate for Ecuadorians in the Twin Cities, said he’s seen his community grow.

The number of asylum cases in Minnesota’s immigration court originating from Ecuador surged by 900 percent in the last five years. With migration at the southern border at record highs, Ecuadorians are finding their way to Minnesota. While they face pressing economic needs, such as work authorization and affordable housing, the community is also building a life here that is attracting more Ecuadorians to settle down in Minnesota.

Guaman is an interim board member with the advocacy and resource organization Movimiento Comunitario Minnesota. He said he’s seen corners of Minneapolis looking more like home—from northeast Minneapolis being called “Little Cuenca,” referring to a city in Ecuador, to an Ecuadorian bakery opening on Lake Street.

“They’re looking for a better life and walking away from where there is no way to survive,” Guaman said of the Ecuadorians coming to Minnesota.

Guaman’s mother was his sponsor when he immigrated to the United States in 2011. She had immigrated in 1995, a year after Guaman was born, to establish herself as a legal permanent resident and sponsor her children. Guaman said she wanted her kids to feel safe and free, especially because they faced discrimination back home as indigenous people. Guaman’s two older brothers crossed the border on their own.

“She fought hard as a single mother to give us an education, food, housing,” he said. “She was looking for a better future for us.”

Guaman went to Wellstone International High School in Minneapolis which, at the time, was for newly arrived immigrant students. At the time, he said the Ecuadorian community in Minneapolis barely existed.

He became involved in activism for undocumented people through Movimiento Comunitario Minnesota because his older brothers are undocumented.

Behind the new restaurants and handicrafts stores though, Guaman said Ecuadorian asylum seekers are stuck in a nightmarish immigration process. In the meantime, many struggle to find jobs and housing.

U.S. Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Adriano Espaillat of New York introduced a bill in February that would grant Ecuadorians Temporary Protected Status, a designation that allows recipients to legally live and work in the United States. For example, immigrants from countries such as El Salvador, Haiti, and Honduras have access to Temporary Protected Status. Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota co-authored the bill.

A group of Ecuadorians created TPS Collective, a group that is advocating for the bill and supporting Ecuadorian asylum seekers in the Twin Cities through local advocacy group COPAL.

“There are many people who need and want to work and because of their immigration status, they cannot do it,” said Evelyn in a translated interview. She is a member of the group who is also undocumented. “With a legal immigration status, it would be easier, and we would have more opportunities to continue contributing to the economy here.”

Evelyn agreed to speak to Sahan Journal if she is only identified by her first name due to immigration concerns. She came to Minnesota from Ecuador a year ago with her five-year-old son to reunite with her partner. Her partner was recently deported.

“My son grew up without his father, so I was looking for one, to improve our quality of life,” Evelyn said. “Also, the issue of the economic crisis and the crisis of insecurity in my country, it was more encouragement to improve my quality of life.”

Evelyn added that she hopes she can obtain work authorization and apply for jobs that have higher wages and benefits. She’s currently working cleaning jobs. She previously worked in tourism in Ecuador. 

‘Finally, I made it’

Ecuadorian asylum seekers are coming to the United States for a variety of reasons, such as violence, racism, economic and political conditions back home, according to Hanne Sandison, an immigration attorney for the Advocates for Human Rights. While economic conditions or general violence alone may not make for a strong asylum case, Sandison added that an attorney should evaluate each client’s story, because there may be stronger asylum claims.

Human Rights Watch also reported a surge in violence in Ecuador after presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio was killed in August. Between 2021 and 2022, the nation experienced its highest homicide rate of 25 homicides per 100,000 people. The global average is six per 100,000.

Sandison said many of the Ecuadorian migrants in Minnesota are families with children.

 “When we start seeing a large number of individuals from a particular country of origin coming in at an unexpected rate—something is going on here,” she said.

According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, border authorities consistently encountered more than 300,000 migrants per month from August to December last year — the highest numbers since 2000. During the 12-month period that ended last September, almost 120,000 people from Ecuador were counted.

More than 520,000 people reached the United States on foot by traveling across a dangerous migration route through Panama’s Darién Gap, according to the Council on Foreign Relations. The roadless route is more than 60 miles of rainforest, mountains, and swamps. It’s also the only land connection between Central and South America.

Israel, 27, is a migrant from Ecuador who came to Minnesota a year ago. On his way, he passed through seven countries, and the Darién Gap, by bus and canoe. 

He said he’s adjusting to life in Minnesota slowly and works construction jobs here and there. He is currently living with Guaman and has found other Ecuadorian friends through volunteer opportunities. He enjoys going to the lakes, biking, and barbecuing in the summer. In the winter, he said he likes to go to the mall or stay in and watch movies with friends.

“It’s a feeling of happiness, because after all of what you go through, all of the suffering, all the crime, all of what you were put through on the journey here, you say, ‘Finally, I made it,’” he said in a translated interview. 

Israel left Ecuador because of discrimination he experienced due to his sexuality. He is identified by his first name because he is undocumented.

Texas Governor Greg Abbot began transporting migrants crossing the southern border to other states in 2022. Since then, more than 100,000 migrants were transported to major U.S. cities, often by bus, NPR reports.

Four buses heading to Chicago in the fall were rerouted to Minnesota due to capacity issues in the city, Guaman said. He added that nearly 60 percent of those people who arrived were from Ecuador. He was able to get in touch and work with a few of those families.

Facing financial burdens

Another factor driving migration out of Ecuador and into the United States is climate change. Indigenous agricultural workers, for example, are unable to make a living from farming corn, potatoes, carrots, lettuce, yucca due to a drought, Guaman said. 

Movimiento Comunitario has been providing food and immigration resources at shelters and hotels in the Twin Cities where many Ecuadorian asylum seekers are living until they find more stable housing.

“We’re providing guidance for people,” Guaman said. “But with the economic and financial state, it’s really hard.”

Without work, Ecuadorian immigrants face major financial burdens, such as issues accessing affordable housing. When an immigrant has a pending asylum case, they can apply for a work permit. But due to a lack of information, Guaman said many are working without authorization.

For example, Guaman said that selling fruit on the street is common in Ecuador. Some fruit vendors are trying to continue their work without permits in Minneapolis, often on street corners – and even in winter. 

Other jobs include cleaning, dishwashing, construction, and other manual labor, Guaman added.

“They don’t know the process here, they’re just trying to survive,” Guaman said. “They just have to make some money to get some food.”

Anna Gerdeen is the executive director of Camden Collective, an organization that hosts a food share program and youth services in north Minneapolis. The food share is open at Salem Evangelical Lutheran Church on Saturdays from 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. and Thursdays from 5 to 6:30 p.m. They also provide people with coats.

“The goal of my community events is to always have an aspect of dignity to it,” Gerdeen said.

Through her work, Gerdeen has become an advocate in the Ecuadorian community, often supporting friends through legal struggles and other issues. 

For example, a pair of 10-year-old twin girls came wearing matching pink sweatshirts and tennis shoes caked in mud. Gerdeen surmised that the mud came from traveling through the Darién Gap. Their family had just been in the United States for a few days. The twins came back a few weeks later wearing the same sweatshirts and shoes, Gerdeen said.

“That’s the kind of situation that the families I run into are going through,” Gerdeen said.

The Camden Collective collects voluntary information on the demographics of people coming to the food share program. They translate the information into Spanish and tell people that they are not reporting the information to federal immigration authorities.

On average, 250 people show up to receive food on Saturdays. Roughly 65 percent of people served last year spoke Spanish. About three-fourths of that group are from Ecuador, Gerdeen said. 

The volunteer staff also reflects the population Camden Collective serves: nearly 75 percent of the volunteers speak Spanish only. Of those volunteers, 80 percent are from Ecuador and almost all of them came in the last couple of months. Many of the volunteers found out about the opportunity when they visited the Camden Collective to get food.

“They’re like, ‘Well, I don’t want to just receive, I want to give.’ So they just jump in,” Gerdeen said. “They see that everyone else is helping so they’re like, ‘I want to help too.’”

Celebrating in new ways

Landon Nelson, dean of operations at El Colegio high school in south Minneapolis, said 44 out of 98 students are from Ecuador. The charter school serves a majority of Spanish-speaking students.

“Our community is super tight-knit in our school,” Nelson said. “They’re very supportive of each other and they’ve brought out their cultural heritage.”

To support the growing Ecuadorian population at El Colegio, the school recently created a position to figure out how to honor credits the Ecuadorian students received in their home country. Nelson said immigrant students who have recently arrived often are starting at a lower grade level than their age due to credit issues. The school takes students up to 21 years old.

Guaman added that he has also worked closely with some students to make sure they’re not missing classes for work. 

“The dream is to be the support for their families,” Guaman said. “It’s a burden for them after going through all that trauma.”

The school also offers language services and preservation classes for students who speak Quichua, an indigenous language spoken in Ecuador.

Nelson added that the school has supported Ecuadorian parents through parent groups. He explained that some of the students’ family members have experienced violence since arriving in Minnesota.

For example, Nelson said families of a few students living on Lake Street were robbed and physically assaulted.

Despite difficulties at home, Nelson said the school has encouraged the Ecuadorian students to use the school as a space to celebrate their culture.

The students recently organized and hosted Ecuadorian Carnaval at the school on Feb. 9. The kids went outside and sprayed soap and glitter all over each other, a common tradition during Carnaval.

“It was freezing cold outside,” Nelson said. “Their hair was frozen, but they were so happy.”

Sahan Journal reporter Alfonzo Galvan contributed to this report.