How immigration crackdown is impacting soccer leagues in Brentwood, Riverhead and other communities

Men’s recreational outdoor soccer leagues in Latino communities have flourished on Long Island over the last few decades. But this year a pall is hanging over the fields as the federal government's immigration crackdown has made many players afraid to come out for games, organizers said.

Some teams are folding for lack of numbers, while some leagues have postponed the starts of their seasons. Even fans are staying away.

"They’re scared to come to the soccer fields," said Miguel Flores, who has been running the Brentwood Soccer League since 1990. Other than the COVID-19 pandemic, when they had to shut down entirely, he’s never seen anything like it, he said. "All the leagues are suffering."

In Riverhead, which usually has 14 teams, the league is down to nine, said its president, Paul Villafranco, who called the drop "a big hit."

The Hempstead league is in even worse shape. It usually has 16 to 18 teams but is down to 10 — and even those players are too afraid to hit the fields, said Robinson Barralaga, the league's president. They were supposed to start playing April 19, but have postponed the start of the season until at least late May.

The Huntington league canceled its season opener on April 5 because no teams were willing to play, league president Elmer Velasquez said. It finally scrounged up nine teams and got underway April 19, though that was still short of the typical 14 to 16 teams. 

"Everything is because of immigration," he said, though organizers note no raids have occurred at the fields on Long Island to date.

The decline in participation is lamented by organizers who contend the soccer leagues provide a healthy outlet for young men, offer a family-oriented weekend activity and even serve as a lynchpin for communities when tragedy hits.

"It's bad, because a lot of young men are staying home instead of being in a park and enjoying soccer," Barralaga told Newsday in Spanish.

Soccer is huge in Latino communities — almost like baseball, basketball and football combined for Americans, Flores said. Bordering on a religion for some fans, the sport has even helped provoke at least one war in Latin America — the 1969 "soccer war" between Honduras and El Salvador.

"Our passion is soccer," Flores said.

Operating under the Soccer Federation of Long Island, seven men’s recreational outdoor soccer leagues compete in Latino-heavy communities. Many players are skilled — some even played for their national teams in their homelands, Flores said.

While each league used to have 10 to 20 teams, now most are down to 8 to 10, and some have as few as five or six, Flores said. Each team typically needs 20 to 25 players. The teams play once a week on Sundays, with the season typically stretching from April through October.

The Brentwood league, down from its typical 10 or more teams to six, did not start its season as scheduled on April 19. They still haven't hit the fields, though partly because of dispute with the state parks department over insurance coverage, Flores said.

Glen Cove wasn't going to start its season either because it had only six teams, below its typical eight to 10, said that league's president, Miguel Alvarez. It got a last-minute influx of three new teams after organizers held a live Facebook event on May 7 discussing their plight, he said. One of the new teams is a group of players from Westbury High School. Now the league plans to get underway in June.

Fewer fans at matches

Villafranco of Riverhead said he is seeing a major downturn among fans, too — mainly friends and relatives of the players. His league typically got hundreds of fans during its Sunday matches, and 1,000 or more for the finals. They often make the soccer matches a family affair. So far this season, fan attendance is down by about half, he said.

"Some of the players and their fans are just not too comfortable coming out to the parks and playing and participating," Villafranco said. "All of us are experiencing it. It's not as big as it once was."

In Huntington, anywhere from 200 to 500 fans used to attend games throughout the day on Sundays, Velasquez said. Now maybe 20 show up.

The leagues trace their troubles to President Donald Trump's mass deportation campaign. Trump says the clampdown is targeting dangerous criminals in the country illegally, though studies and a Newsday investigation have shown that most of the people detained have no criminal record. The campaign has stoked protests nationwide, led to the ouster of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and prompted Democrats in Congress to hold up funding for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for weeks. 

Trump's handling of immigration issues has about a 40% nationwide approval rate, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released this week. 

Anti-ICE rallies peaked after federal agents killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January. ICE arrested 325 people on Long Island that month, Newsday has reported, in what was the peak of operations locally to that point.

The crackdown has also had an impact on soccer leagues around the country. Last fall, the Oregon Youth Soccer Association reported that up to 16 teams dropped out of competitions in Portland because of reports of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in local parks.

Even the World Cup, which is coming to the United States, Canada and Mexico this summer, has felt the fallout. The union representing 2,000 workers including cooks, servers and bartenders at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles has threatened to strike because of the potential presence of ICE agents at World Cup venues this June and July. 

The Trump administration has said ICE will be present at World Cup matches to conduct routine enforcement work and to help with security. MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, will host eight matches, including the final on July 19.

While immigration agents have conducted numerous raids and arrests in Brentwood over the past year, according to advocates, they have not raided the soccer fields, Flores said.

"The government agencies respect us," he said.

But many players are still suffering from what he called "the fear factor." Many worry they will get stopped at checkpoints on the way to games. They often travel together in vans or other vehicles, making them feel particularly vulnerable as a target, he said.

One team that was traveling to a game last summer on Long Island heard about U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement presence in the community through social media and turned around and went back home, Flores said.

While many of the players have some type of legal status, they are still afraid since the raids and enforcement actions can sweep up people with legal status including green card holders, Flores said.

Long Island has become a focal point of the raids, advocates have said, partly because of its growing Latino population, which by  census count jumped from 165,238 to 610,696 between 1990 and July 1, 2023.

The impact of the downturn in the "futbol" leagues transcends the sport, Flores said, since soccer gives young men a healthy outlet that for some keeps them away from potentially becoming involved with drugs, alcohol and other ills. Soccer is a physically demanding sport, and players can't keep up on the field if they are abusing their bodies with drugs or alcohol, he said.

It’s also a release from the everyday grind of sometimes back-breaking work in construction, landscaping and other manual labor jobs, Villafranco said.

"Most of them have played their whole life and it's just something that brings them happiness," he said. "It's an escape from their everyday life."

"People come with their with their families and it's very family friendly," he added.

An uncertain future

On a recent Sunday at the Huntington league, a coach yelled out instructions alternating between English and Spanish. "Portero, buenisimo!" he shouted, meaning "Goalie, great!" after a spectacular save.

One 18-year-old player named Jose who was leaving the field after a game said it was his first in the league — he usually plays for his high school team. He was thrilled to be there.

"I feel love for futbol," he said in English, using the Spanish word for soccer. He did not want his last name to be used because he was concerned for his safety.

On the East End, the Riverhead league was able to play through its regular season last fall, with 14 teams showing up since the immigration crackdown did not appear to be in full swing yet in that area, Villafranco said.

"We started to hear it a little bit, like toward the end of the season," he said.

The deportation campaign appeared to accelerate after that — ICE activity in Greenport in February prompted one-quarter of students to stay out of Greenport public schools that day as panic, fear and chaos gripped the region, officials said. 

Now Villafranco isn’t sure what will happen next with his league, which he said helps bind the community together. In 2021, the league held a fundraising tournament to help pay funeral costs for a 24-year-old player and four relatives killed in a house fire in Riverhead. Local businesses donated food, supplies and even DJ services. 

"We're going to see as the season progresses, how many spectators we get. Hopefully no teams drop out," Villafranco said. "We're kind of up in the wind right now. We don't really know what's going to go on."