One year after federal agents began Operation Charlotte’s Web in Charlotte, people and businesses in immigrant communities say they are still feeling its effects.
Willy Aceituno, a Honduran-born U.S. citizen, says Customs and Border Protection agents detained him on the operation’s first morning, Nov. 15, 2025.
Aceituno says he had already shown identification to one group of agents, who checked it and let him go. About 10 minutes later, he says, another group blocked his car, broke a window and pulled him out. Agents handcuffed him and took him away in an SUV with about a dozen other detainees. They released him soon after, he says.
A year later, Aceituno says the experience still weighs on him.
“A year has passed, and now that we’re just days away from it, all those memories come back — when they threw me to the ground, when they didn’t respect my rights,” Aceituno said in Spanish. “They can do whatever they want; they abuse their authority and don’t care about anything.”
Operation Charlotte’s Web was one in a series of Department of Homeland Security operations that began after President Trump took office for his second term in January 2025. Agents had rounded up immigrants in cities like Chicago and Los Angeles before Charlotte, and in Minneapolis after.
In that city in January, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot Renée Nicole Good to death. Later that month, CBP officers fatally shot Alex Pretti. Both were American citizens.
Aceituno says those fatalities make him feel grateful.
“So now I’m fortunate I wasn’t killed for what happened to those people," Aceituno said. "Thank God I am still alive.”
Data from the Deportation Data Project, which tracks statistics on federal immigration enforcement, shows 402 people were arrested in North Carolina during the operation’s first week, from Nov. 15 to 23. Of those, 195 had no criminal records; 107 had prior convictions; and 100 had pending charges.
The effects rippled to families’ schools and daily routines. The Urban Institute interviewed dozens of parents in mixed-status Latino families in Charlotte and Chicago. Nearly half said their children had missed at least a few days of school because of enforcement fears.
I encountered the same over a couple of weeks as I reported this story. I knocked on doors, visited restaurants, made calls and sent emails. If people were willing to talk, they insisted on remaining anonymous.
The Urban Institute report also describes how community groups helped families with food, housing, health care, transportation and family-preparedness resources.
Charlotte-based OurBRIDGE for Kids says more people have come to its Charlotte is Home Center since last November.
“We are currently doing three times in terms of family support services, like food referrals, clothing, housing,” ourBRIDGE's Salma Villareal said. “Every single month, we are receiving more and more people through our Charlotte is Home Center.”
Business owners say customers’ fear has affected sales, too.
David Rebolloso, owner of North Tryon Laundromat, says some families who used to come in together have stopped.
“Moms would come in during the middle of the week and do laundry with their kids and all that while their father or husband was working,” Rebolloso said. “And we don’t see that anymore.”
Rebolloso estimates his revenue fell by as much as half last November. It has stabilized but remains about 30% below its level before Charlotte's Web.
“I've heard comments about people buying their own washers and dryers to put in their houses so they don't have to come out, and just minimize going out,” Rebolloso said.
At La Morenita Bakery in east Charlotte, owner Rey Hernandez says he can measure his customers' reluctance to leave home in cake orders.
“On a weekend, on a Friday or Saturday, we would have an average of 10, 15 cakes, to actually having two small cakes; that was actually all we had on Saturday," Hernandez said. "Sunday, not even a single cake, not even one order.”
Hernandez says that fear hasn’t faded, even as the months have passed.
“I was actually hoping the summer was going to pick up a lot, but people are afraid," Hernandez said. "You still may not hear it, but there is still a lot of action, ICE around here in these neighborhoods, at the QT. We see them from time to time.”
Hernandez estimates foot traffic fell by 90% last November and has recovered to only about 40% to 50% of its previous weekend level.
Both Hernandez and Rebolloso say they remain hopeful customers will return and business will recover — eventually. Neither could say how long that will take.
