Miller’s/Trump’s campaign to rid America of those born here and emigrated here continues?
Complaint’s from farmers have resulted in a quiet paradox of MORE migrants allowed in help farmers get products picked and shipped to Americans and Abroad with little to no policing….
And there ARE problem’s with program which relies on employers, who of course, want to make money , some anyway they can…
Miller lost this one…..
And Homeland just isn’t focused or want’s to intervene into a critical economic system that IS even more complex and politically tied to the American economy that Miller and Trump’s actions have already NOT helped….
They travel on chartered buses through the night to farms where they spend most of the year picking crops like blueberries and celery, produce still harvested best by human hands.
These are America’s H-2A workers, named for the visa the federal government grants them. The program is uncapped, and available to seasonal agricultural employers who can’t find domestic workers. Since 2013, as farmworkers have aged and immigration has slowed, H-2A holders have quadrupled to become a sixth of the agricultural labor force.
The program is poised to grow even faster. As the Trump administration pursues undocumented immigrants, it’s becoming harder to find workers, foreign or native-born. And the White House has restricted many avenues for legal immigration, such as refugee status, H-1B visas for skilled workers and any immigrant visas for people from 75 countries.
But farmers pushed back, and the Agriculture Department responded. Last fall, it lowered the wages that guest workers must be paid, substantially decreasing the cost of the program. In the first half of the 2026 fiscal year, the Labor Department approved 17 percent more visas than in the same period the year before.
In theory, the program is mutually beneficial. Growers get crucial help during the growing season, and foreign workers make far more than they would at home without having to risk sneaking across the border.
Amando Chavez’s sons had been working for AgriLabor, a farm contractor in Oregon, and recommended him for an H-2A position in 2023. He has come every year since. He farms some of his own land in Mexico’s Michoacan State, but doesn’t always get the price he would like for his vegetables.
“I come here, I get more money,” Mr. Chavez said, in hesitant English, while waiting for orientation before joining the cherry harvest. He never considered coming illegally. Although he won’t earn as much this year with the lower wage rates, he said it was still worth the trip.
The program’s rapid expansion, however, comes with significant risks. H-2A visas have historically been ridden with fraud, labor trafficking and abuse. According to the Government Accountability Office, of the 2,857 investigations that the Labor Department pursued from 2018 to 2023, 84 percent found violations….
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The agriculture industry is trying to police itself and reward good behavior, but the efforts depend on the good will of growers and labor contractors, which take up an increasing share of the visas.
“Having workers tied to an employer for their legal status, their wages, working conditions, their ability to return, creates such a power differential that really exacerbates vulnerability to forced labor,” said Rachel Micah-Jones, executive director of the Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, which advocates on behalf of migrant workers….
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The problem is also baked into the structure of the H-2A statute, which binds workers to one employer. Michael Clemens, an economist who studies immigration, believes that allowing visa holders to change jobs is the best way to prevent abuse. South Korea, for example, lets workers quit and be rehired.
“Giving workers the opportunity to seek out better employers is so much more effective than any regulatory apparatus,” Mr. Clemens said. “Workers have the strongest incentive to make sure their rights are enforced.”…
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