immigration
Maryland’s crab industry struggles in absence of temporary work visas
As a result of a Trump administration immigration policy, crab houses on the Eastern Shore of Maryland have been short on labor this summer. Midway through the crabbing season, some in the industry are losing customers and profits in what might be the new reality for an industry dependent on immigrant labor.
House GOP tries anew on ag guest worker legislation
For the second time this summer, House Republican leaders backed creation of a new agricultural guest worker program, this time a three-year H-2C visa available for fish farms, dairy producers and meatpackers as well as crop farmers. Rep. Dan Newhouse of Washington state applauded Speaker Paul Ryan and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy "for their commitment to bring this to the floor" but the bill was not on the agenda for House action before the August recess.
Prospects dimming for House vote on ag guestworker bill
House Republican leaders promised a vote this month on creating a new agricultural guestworker program. But it now appears that vote may be delayed, in part due to inter-party squabbling over more comprehensive immigration reform.
In tussle over immigration bills, farmworkers play a role
House Republican leaders say they will call votes next week on two immigration bills dealing with so-called Dreamers. The bill favored by conservatives would create, as a sidelight, a new, year-round H-2C visa program for farmworkers.
Don’t mess with farmers, warns biggest U.S. farm group
Voting against the farm bill can invite electoral consequences, the president of the largest U.S. farm group wrote in an essay. “Rural America still packs an influential punch,” he said.
ICE officers target upstate New York farmworker
Officers from Immigrations and Customs Enforcement targeted a farmworker in Rome, New York, in an early morning confrontation Wednesday. The officers detained the worker while his employer attempted to film the incident.
Fearing Trump policies, immigrants drop out of SNAP, WIC
Amid fears of a new immigration policy from the Trump administration, immigrants hoping to become permanent U.S. residents are dropping out of public food assistance programs, reports the New York Times.
As ICE threatens, meatpacker struggles to find workers
In December 2006, Immigration and Customs Enforcement carried out the largest workplace raid in history. They arrested over 1,300 workers in six states, including 300 from Cactus, Texas, a small town with just over 3,000 residents. The Cactus workers were picked up from a meatpacking plant, then owned by Swift & Co. before it was acquired by JBS in 2007.
Heeding Farm Bureau, Goodlatte alters farm labor legislation
As the House potentially takes up immigration reform in the coming weeks, the largest U.S. farm group wants to make sure agricultural labor is part of the legislation. The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee has revised his plan for a new, year-round H-2C visa program to make it more attractive to farmers, who worry about their existing, undocumented workforce as well as the creation of a more manageable guestworker program.
Party-line divisions as House Judiciary works on new guestworker program
House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte tweaked his bill for a new year-round H-2C guestworker visa program but Democrats on the committee said the changes worsened a bill that greatly expands the range of jobs the foreign workers could fill. During a rancorous bill-drafting session, the Republican majority defeated on party-line votes Democratic amendments for higher pay for H-2C workers and to bar them from forestry jobs.
House Judiciary chairman proposes year-round agricultural guest-worker program
The U.S. would scrap its much-criticized H-2A system of short-term visas for agricultural workers and replace it with an H-2C program that allows foreign laborers to stay in the country for up to three years under a bill filed by House Judiciary chairman Bob Goodlatte. The bill also would allow those laborers, for the first time, to work in dairies and processing plants. The committee is scheduled to vote on the bill on Wednesday, at a moment when lawmakers want to resolve the issue of "dreamers," youths brought illegally into the U.S. by their parents.
Alaska salmon plants hurt by labor shortage
Even as Alaska experienced a banner year for sockeye salmon, some commercial fishermen had to stop hauling in the fish because there weren’t enough workers to process them.
DACA demise may not hit agriculture as hard as other industries
President Trump’s decision to scrap the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program is unlikely to have a major impact on the nation’s agricultural workforce, says Capital Press, quoting an immigration attorney who estimates that “only 5 to 10 percent of the 800,000 people benefiting from DACA ... work in agriculture.”
Canada’s guest farmworker program accused of human rights abuses
With Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau taking to Twitter to welcome immigrants to his country, Canada has gained a reputation for being friendly to new arrivals. But now the nation’s guest farmworker program has come under scrutiny for human rights abuses and treatment that is anything but hospitable.
Trump backs merit plan that halves legal immigration
Returning to a signature issue of his campaign, President Trump endorsed a Senate bill for a skills-based system for immigration that could have a distant effect on farm labor because it would halve the flow of legal immigrants. The Ag Workforce Coalition of farm groups said it "continues to work with key lawmakers on legislation that would address agriculture's needs" for a legal and reliable supply of farm workers with hopes the issue will gain traction in the fall.
Anti-terrorism law would let Trump build border wall through wildlife refuge
The U.S. Customs and Border Patrol says it could use a 2005 anti-terrorism law — the Real ID Act — to all President Trump’s border wall to be built through a national wildlife refuge in Texas, without having to conduct an environmental impact studies. The studies are usually mandated for any new construction on federal lands under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
House Judiciary chair aims for new agricultural guestworker program
During his time as House Agriculture chairman a decade ago, Rep. Bob Goodlatte says he learned firsthand that the H-2A agricultural guestworker program is outdated and should be replaced. Now the House Judiciary chairman, Goodlatte says he will sponsor a bill for a new guestworker program that, in addition to foreign workers recruited to work in America, could cover the tens of thousands of undocumented farmworkers already in the country — but with no pathway to permanent legal status.
Trump’s grade in agriculture? A ‘C’ overall, says farm policy expert
President Trump's best decision on agriculture was to put Sonny Perdue in charge of USDA, says economist Barry Flinchbaugh, a farm policy expert and Kansas State University professor. Perdue provides sound advice to the president, said Flinchbaugh, who gave Trump a "C" average on the four issues of farm bill, trade, immigration and deregulation, reported Drovers.
DHS streamlines protections against deportation
In a step hailed by the United Farm Workers union, the Homeland Security Department announced a streamlined and expedited process to protect non-citizen workers from immigration-related retaliation during labor disputes with their employers. "Unscrupulous employers who prey on the vulnerability of non-citizen workers harm all workers and disadvantage businesses who play by the rules," said Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.