Migrants selling fruit and candy in New York's subway are plagued by fear and uncertainty
A migrant woman from Ecuador told NBC News she has to bring her daughter with her to sell fruit on the subway because she has nowhere else to leave her.
They’ve become a part of the fabric of New York City life, slipping in and out of subway cars and calling out to riders as they try to sell their wares, typically an assortment of candy bars and gum. On train platforms, they sell various fruits like mango and watermelon, cut up and divided into plastic cups. Often the candy and fruit vendors are migrant women, sometimes seen with their young children in tow.
NBC News approached several women on subway platforms in Manhattan and Queens over the past year asking them to share the stories of their arrivals in the U.S. All refused out of fear that their children could be taken away or that they could face a steep fine. With help from Algun Dia, an outreach project specifically aimed at helping migrant vendors, NBC News was put in contact with a woman named Lorena who arrived in the U.S. last year with her husband and their 3-year-old daughter and has applied for asylum and work authorization. While she waits for that legal permission, she has been earning about $50 a day selling fruit while carrying her daughter on her back.
Lorena agreed to speak on the condition that her last name not be used and her child not be identified.
“Where am I going to leave her?” Lorena said of her daughter in Spanish. “Sometimes she sleeps and I carry her with a bedsheet tied around. I push the cart.”
Lorena arrived in the U.S. from Ecuador last year with her husband and child. NBC NewsFood vending in the city is illegal without a license, and it can come with a fine of $1,000 or more. The city has enforced the law in the past, and at least one high-profile instance posted to social media led to public outcry. According to the city’s Sanitation Department, the coordinating agency for street vending enforcement, more than 3,000 summonses have been issued to unlicensed vendors this year. Food vending licenses cost $50 in application fees, but an additional permit is needed to operate mobile units that food is sold from, like pushcarts. The city issues only a finite number of permits, and the waitlist is closed.
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