Picturesque mountain town becomes unexpected migrant hotspot, sparking backlash as locals blame Yellowstone

A picturesque Montana city has become an unexpected hotspot for America's migrant boom, sparking a backlash from a group of hard-right residents.

Bozeman, once a quiet backwater known for its small-town charm, is now one of the fastest-growing small cities in the country.

Home to around 56,000 people, the city's economy has grown exponentially and thousands of jobs have been created. But some long standing residents fear their community is being destroyed.

Schools are struggling to cope with the influx of multilingual children, while locals say they are being priced out of their homes.

A small but vocal minority have directed their ire at the migrants themselves, with reports of a spike in hate crimes against the Latino community. 

The first wave of migration, however, came not from the U.S. southern border but from Montana's western neighbors.

Hundreds of affluent Americans from left-leaning states such as California, Oregon and Colorado, upped sticks to Bozeman and Gallatin County in the wake of the pandemic.

They were lured in by the city's proximity to Yellowstone National Park and Big Sky, an upscale skiing town home to the Yellowstone Club, whose members include Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg.

Some locals have even blamed the popular television series 'Yellowstone', starring Kevin Costner, for romanticizing the Mountain West. 

They are angry that their once working-class neighborhood has been taken over by dozens of tech and software companies, while the average home now sells for $770,000.

'There are a lot of out-of-staters that have some money, and they're willing to pay above asking price,' Dylan Heintz, 28, who grew up in the city, told The New York Times. 'That definitely hurts people.' 

Bozeman's population has grown by 50 per cent in a decade, sparking an uptick in bumper stickers proclaiming 'Montana is Full'.

But the wealthy families who now occupy these new homes have brought with them a second, altogether different wave of migrants.

Their demands for the upscale amenities that they left behind, from high-end dining to luxury housing, requires intensive labor.

And for this, Bozeman, like much of America, has turned to an ever growing pool of undocumented migrants.

The Latino portion of Gallatin County's population has grown by almost 140 per cent - from 2.8 percent to 5 percent - between 2010 and 2020, according to U.S. census data.

This is thought to be an underestimate as it does not include 2021 - Bozeman's most explosive year of housing growth.

As many as 723 migrants with immigration cases have settled in Gallatin County, with around a third of these coming from Honduras, according to analysis of immigration court data by The Washington Post.

Others have come from countries like Guatemala, Peru and Venezuela.

The number of students who need additional English language instruction has doubled in a matter of years to 350.

Their arrival has transformed Bozeman seemingly overnight. 

Now the sleek modern homes of Bozeman's new west coast imports stand cheek-to-jowl with RVs and tent encampments that house the city's poor Latino population.

A new Whole Foods caters to one half of the new arrivals, while lines of taco trucks feed the other.

In some respects, Bozeman is flourishing.

Hispanic immigrants contributed more than $300million in economic benefits to the city in 2022, according to a study by South NorthNexus, a nonprofit that offers legal aid in Montana.

But not everyone is happy.

A group of ultra conservative residents have formed Take Back Bozeman, which decries what is deemed to be a growing 'anti-white' and 'anti-Christian' sentiment across the country.

Their Facebook page, which has 1,200 followers, describes the group as an assembly of 'concerned citizens doing all we can to NOT become Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle, SF, or even Boise'.

It rails against the 'rapidly growing Hispanic presence' in Bozeman, claiming the effects are mostly 'not desirable', with sectors of the economy becoming Latino 'enclaves'.

The group argues, without producing empirical evidence, that immigrants will bring 'brazen' crime 'representative of the places they come from'.

One post adds: 'If you choose to come here, you are choosing a vastly white city, with its own culture and its own norms, where we speak English and so should you, and if you do not know Christ, we would be happy to introduce you.'

Take Back Bozeman is responsible for multiple threats to local immigration workers, according to High Country News.

The group regularly posts comments about Bienvenidos, the city's largest migrant aid group, including the names and faces of its workers, as well as news stories involving crimes committed by migrants.

One such incident saw a downtown bar fight end with two Hispanic men attacking a man with knives and hammers, leaving him with cuts to most of his body and a deep laceration to his face.

Gallatin County arrest records indicate that both suspects are subject to an immigration detainer from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, also known as an ICE hold, according to local CBS media.

Commenting on the incident in February, Bozeman Police Detective Captain McNeil appeared to echo the concerns of certain residents.

'I think that as we grow as a city, we're going to see more violent crime,' he said. 'And we're going to have more issues like this.'

He is not the only local official to raise the alarm.

Gallatin County Sheriff Dan Springer said in January that he and his deputies were seeing a growing number of illegal immigrants in the community, with six individuals being placed under an ICE hold.

It has become a hot topic across Montana, with Republican Representative Ryan Zinke slamming the Biden administration following the news that five migrants, reportedly from Venezuela, had been flown to the small city of Kalispell, Flathead County, from New York.

'The only way an illegal immigrant from South America ends up in Montana is if a "nonprofit" connected with the Biden Administration moves them there,' Zinke said in a statement.

'Montana law enforcement, schools, hospitals and safety nets are being stressed to their max because of the Biden border crisis. It's unacceptable and absolutely needs to end now.'

But aid groups have fired back, blaming local officials for fueling anti-immigrant sentiment and a rise in hate crimes.

One Bienvenidos volunteer told High Country News that she saw a white girl tip a garbage can over a Latina student and call her 'Mexican trash' at a middle school.

Rosa, who fled gang violence in Honduras in 2020 along with her husband, Luis, told High Country News she worried about what this environment was doing to their youngest daughter.

'The bus brings her home and then she locks herself in her room,' she said.