More than 60 Venezuelan migrants have arrived in Michigan and are being assisted by the Church of the Messiah while staying at a shelter in Detroit. The church started noticing the migrants show up for Sunday services and quickly collected footwear and clothing for them, as well as provided food for them.
“Everybody in the community told them to come to the church,” Pastor Barry Randolph of the Church of the Messiah said. Some of the migrants came directly from Venezuela while others have spent time in other countries like Peru, Ecuador and Colombia before coming to the United States.
Many are fleeing economic hardships and political corruption. The United Nations estimates more than seven million people have left Venezuela, many to other South American countries with some making their way to the U.S.
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One Detroit Senior Producer Bill Kubota spent a Sunday afternoon at the church talking with Pastor Randolph, Jennine Spencer Gilbert, a volunteer who has been leading the efforts to help, and some of the migrants about the help they’re receiving from the church and community and the support still needed.
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