ICE raids leave crops unharvested at California farms: ‘We need the labor’
ICE raids leave crops unharvested at California farms: ‘We need the labor’
Trump’s immigration crackdown has made many immigrant farm workers scared to go to work
Trump’s immigration crackdown has made many immigrant farm workers scared to go to work
Lisa Tate is a sixth-generation farmer in Ventura county, California, an area that produces billions of dollars worth of fruit and vegetables each year, much of it hand-picked by immigrants in the US illegally.
Tate knows the farms around her well. And she says she can see with her own eyes how raids carried out by agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) in the area’s fields earlier this month, part of Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, have frightened off workers.
“In the fields, I would say 70% of the workers are gone,” she said in an interview. “If 70% of your workforce doesn’t show up, 70% of your crop doesn’t get picked and can go bad in one day. Most Americans don’t want to do this work. Most farmers here are barely breaking even. I fear this has created a tipping point where many will go bust.“
Then pay living wages. It's hard to feel sorry for you when you're crying about losing your slave labor.
This is a problem that's been brewing for a long time. Their business model is untenable at the scale they're at without relying on near slave labour. Their massive profits come more from scale, than absolute margin, so if they actually payed a living wage they'd be in the red.
So now y'all will have to wait until the coming food shortages drive up prices before the pay is enough to interest other Americans that'd otherwise have no interest in those sorts of jobs.
The owners won't play ball without getting their pound of flesh.
Every time a ceo whines about how they "can't" do something, everyone should add "...without stopping the siphoning of ever more money to our shareholders and ourselves."
what’s wrong? no labor? pay more.
Ain't no MAGAs running to the field or up the ladders to take these hard jobs at any price.
Have you seen American history? We will do anything we can to not have to pay for labor. Even after slavery, using gray area immigrants has been commonplace for well over a century. Anything to save a buck.
The best outcome at this point would be to build machines that can harvest all the various unique crops to break the cycle, we may even be technologically advanced to finally do it, if we don't destroy ourselves first.
How do other countries handle food harvesting labor? I'll research in parallel, but curious, I've never actually thought about that question before.
capitalism. the problem is not american history but instead capitalism. it needs to go.
California has a reputation for being liberal, leftist, and progressive… but remember that the vast, overwhelming majority of farmers in the state are as fascist and blindly, religiously Republican as the most red parts of the most red states. They voted for this.
They also voted against slave labor (not only the farmers, but the liberal progressive rest of the state).
They wanted to keep THEIR illegal workers. They just wanted everyone ELSE'S to be deported. Hypocrisy is live and well in the US.
The US will reap what it sowed and it won't be pretty.
Source: US citizen, currently
Bout time for them farmers to pull up their bootstraps and get out into their fields. Get to work! Those pesky immigrants are no longer in your way
Lisa Tate, farmer in Ventura county who donated $250 to republiQan Sen. Suzette Martinez Valladares?
Sen. Valladares who founded a Republican Latino caucus in the CA legislature, saying
the Democratic-led Latino Caucus would support "antiquated solutions" to issues such as farmworkers' rights that “keep Latinos under the monolithic umbrella of being poor, agricultural workers.” ?
Huh.
That sounds straight-up stupid.
“That’s not the modern-day Latino,” she said.
…The 35-member Latino Caucus, historically led by Democrats after the first Latino lawmakers were elected in 1962, has focused on a wide range of policy priorities, including giving protections and equal access to immigrants regardless of legal status, promoting STEM programs in schools and expanding paid sick leave and housing to farmworkers.
“Even in the Latino Caucus, you have moderates, progressives and everything in between,” Miguel Santiago, a Democratic former Assembly member and Latino caucus member. “But one thing that has always united us through every argument is our unwavering support for Latino communities, particularly those who are undocumented.”
Santiago said that he is “skeptical about the sincerity” of the Hispanic Legislative Caucus representing Latino interests, particularly when it comes to protecting the undocumented and that those differences “are irreconcilable.”
Anthony Rendon (D-Lakewood), former Assembly speaker who left behind a legacy of progressive reforms, including giving farmworkers overtime pay and expanding childhood education, agrees that there should be a Latino caucus for each party.
"I never understood why they wanted to be part of our caucus other than obstructing us," he said. "They would just yell, we'd take a vote, and they'd lose."
While I was initially frothing at the mouth at your comment, and I still think that her donation obviously wasn’t in her best interests, the vast vast majority of her donations on that page are to either libs or labor groups (͡•_ ͡• )
Presuming the other person is also her. Which, if so, is odd that the one R donation came in from a different address and type of donation.
Latinos for Republicans are just brown people begging to be considered white but will always be bean-eating wet backs to Republicans.
Why isn't Lisa Tate being arrested for labor law violations?
Cuz she's the exploiter. The US only punishes the exploited. Especially if they're not white.
How are they gonna prove she violated labor law if the deportees never got due process and thus can not be proven to be here illegally? If they never charged the migrants with a crime, simply just exile them, there's no rope to pull on, no thread to follow.
Wish the corps and field owners hiring undocumented immigrants for chump change would be penalized. These farm workers are doing intensive labor and deserve way more pay.
Better yet, put every maga asshat out in the fields. This is exactly what they wanted right? Immigrants out of US jobs. I'm sure they are lining up right now.
Isnt this what a national guard should be used for. They should be protecting California crops from Ice. Our country will loss so much in produce because of these ice raids that will ruin billions of dollars of food.
So the national guard should be used to make sure farmers get to keep their slave labor?
ICE shouldn't be doing what they're doing, but if farmers paid their workers a living wage this wouldn't be an issue.
Initially I thought you meant the National Guard should be planting/picking crops…
I've got an idea, what if the landowners loaned plots of the farm to smaller farmers, and those farmers would pay off that loan by sharing their crops with the owner? you could even manage your conditional employees with an app, called Tuber or something
“This is ICE! Round up all your undocumented day laborers”
“Sir, I’m too busy for that right now. If you and your men can help me pick all these tomatoes, I’ll have time to tell you where they’re all hiding.”
— 8 hours later —
“Thanks for helping get all the produce in. As you can see, we no longer have any undocumented day laborers, so now we depend on regular ICE raids to keep the farm going. Have a nice day!”
Hah, the reality is they would arrest them for harbouring illegals and beat the shit out of them until they got their answer.
"They're hiding the strawberries! Pick them all and you'll find them!"
Oddly, in some videos where the masked ICE cowards are talking, they sound like Chicanos.
If you needed the labor you would do something, protest or talk to your rich friends to stop it.
But since neither you or the US citizens don't really care, don't complain.
Those articles are a spam, lead to nothing that we already know.These ICE agents who are the same people who love to screech "THEY TAYKIN ER JERRBBZ" are...literally taking people's jobs
Maybe they can get some of those J6 Nazis to go harvest?
Prisons: "hey inmates, we have a field trip for you today!“ ...and every other day while we are getting paid for your labour
Luckily, CA voted to remain a slave state, so we can have affordable food on our plates again soon!
Make food greatly expensive again! Thanks trump!
Pack on a few pounds now. Food's about to get cripplingly expensive
US agriculture will collapse and the void will be filled by Silicon Valley tech bros with their vertical farms backed by VC money. Elon Musk’s brother owns a vertical farming business and Peter Thiel has invested in lab grown meat companies. Remember the goal of these techno fascists is to create sovereign territories aka “Freedom Cities”within the US, and agriculture is vital to make such a thing a reality.
Lol
And still the morons believe Trumps "Come unto me" bullshit.
Anything to keep Stephen Miller happy, eh?