Posted on 07/30/2011 2:57:06 PM PDT by Steelfish
Farmers Oppose G.O.P. Bill on Immigration
JESSE McKINLEY & JULIA PRESTON July 30 Calif. — Farmers across the country are rallying to fight a Republican-sponsored bill that would force them and all other employers to verify the legal immigration status of their workers, a move some say could imperil not only future harvests but also the agricultural community’s traditional support for conservative candidates.
The bill was proposed by Representative Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican who is the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. It would require farmers — who have long relied on a labor force of immigrants, a majority here without legal documents — to check all new hires through E-Verify, a federal database run by the Department of Homeland Security devised to ferret out illegal immigrants.
Farm laborers, required like other workers to show that they are authorized to take jobs in the United States, often present Social Security numbers and some form of picture ID. Employers, many of them labor contractors providing crews to farms, have not been required to check the information and are discouraged by antidiscrimination laws from looking at it too closely. But it is an open secret that many farmworkers’ documents are false.
Supporters of E-Verify, an electronic system that is currently mandatory for most federal contractors but voluntary for other employers, argue that it would eliminate any doubt about workers’ legal status. But farmers say it could cripple a $390 billion industry that relies on hundreds of thousands of willing, low-wage immigrant workers to pick, sort and package everything from avocados to zucchini.
“This would be an emergency, a dire, dire situation,” said Nancy Foster, president of the U.S. Apple Association, adding that the prospect of an E-Verify check would most likely mean that many immigrant workers would simply not show up.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
BS I worked in Ag my whole life.
Farmers just want free labor.
Framing is the reason we face the immigration issues we do.
BS I worked in Ag my whole life.
Farmers just want free labor.
Farming is the reason we face the immigration issues we do.
It would require farmers — who have long relied on a labor force of immigrants, a majority here without legal documents —
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Not in the part of farm country I live in (Plains/Midwest). Farmers hate illegals and don’t trust them around here.
Makes people feel bad.
(Snork).(/s)
They wouldn’t be breaking the law, by hiring illegals by any chance? Just wondering.
Are there economic consequences to following the law? Maybe.
While I totally favor governmental efforts to crackdown on illegal immigration, I do not think it is the job of employers to verify the legal status of their employees. You should be able to hire people without asking the DHS whether it is OK or not.
““This would be an emergency, a dire, dire situation,” said Nancy Foster, president of the U.S. Apple Association,..”
I am not sympathetic.
Truck farmers and orchardists hire illegals on a temporary seasonal or need basis, then let them go. These illegal aliens then are not working year round and the public, in the end, has to pick up the welfare costs.
There is a solution. Asparagus growers despaired of ever getting in their crops without illegal alien workers, and then an invention which allowed the harvesting of asparagus appeared, saving their businesses.
It can be done, and for the sake of the rest of the nation, it must be done.
How about the GOVERNMENT certifies the LEGALITY of ANYONE here FIRST!!!??? You don’t have the right (according to the gov’t) to work here? No job...THEN, if they are hired, you could go after the employers...
You perhaps have worked in agriculture your whole life...and how many years has that been. Also your profile says you are from California.....has it occurred to you that the socialist shittehole you live in is just one of 49 other states...Farming is not the reason that we face the immigration issues we do in the other 49 states...what a stupid statement!
Not here in Tennessee! Our farmer’s smuggle them in by the truck loads to work the tobacco fields and other farm crops. They get a free pass from law enforcement. Our former sheriff even told his officers not to bother them. I haven’t seen his replacement take a stand against them either. I think we need to force everybody on the Welfare system (except the elderly and disabled) to work the farms and send the illegals packing.
I expect the farmers to threaten us with, “You can pick your own damn peas!”, the way things are going in this country these days. There’s definitely too much whining going on our there.
So the farmers are openly admitting they hire illegal immigrants and taking subsidies on top of that.
E-verify is just another ploy used by government to force employers to do the job they refuse to do.
As a non-farmer, I’ve still got to call BS here. I can see farmers worrying about partial enforcement, because then their less ethical neighbors using illegals will have a pricing advantage. But why would they gripe over real enforcement? If the price of lettuce goes up, so be it—the price of a lot of other things, like healthcare and taxes to cover education and incarceration would be going down. The farm products would still be sold, and the farmers wouldn’t be hurt.
As a non-farmer, I’ve still got to call BS here. I can see farmers worrying about partial enforcement, because then their less ethical neighbors using illegals will have a pricing advantage. But why would they gripe over real enforcement? If the price of lettuce goes up, so be it—the price of a lot of other things, like healthcare and taxes to cover education and incarceration would be going down. The farm products would still be sold, and the farmers wouldn’t be hurt.
Maybe I’m missing the factor of international competition... like from Mexican farms... but I don’t think that’s a major factor.
Well IF these farmers are now knowingly accepting false SS# and ID that means they are paying minimum wage.
Kinda makea a lie out of the “ working for low wages” whine they use.
there is a visa allowing an UNLIMITED number of LEGAL immigrants to come to USA to do Ag work
This is all BS
NPR, in its typical fashion, had a sob story about Georgia blackberry farmers who lamented the fact that they couldn't find seasonal workers for their farms.
When the reporter asked the owner whether he would consider hiring parolees or raising his wages he told the correspondent that he would rather shut down his farm.
The term is "privatize profits/socialize costs". As you point out, they get the benefit of cheap labor, while the rest of us have to deal with the cost of the illegals.
I'm willing to pay a bit more for my cabbages. As you also point out, if they didn't have cheap illegal labor, it would create a market of picking machines, which would permanently solve the problem.
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