SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Agricultural laborers pick lemons inside the orchards of Samag Services, Inc., in Mesa, California on March 27, 2020. (Photo: Brent Stirton/Getty Images)
'Bullying of Marginalized Workers': Trump Moves to Slash Pay of Guest Farmworkers Amid Covid-19 Crisis
"While farmworkers are working during a pandemic to pick the food that feeds our families during this crisis, Trump is looking to cut their pay."
Apr 11, 2020
Led by White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, the Trump administration is reportedly pushing to slash the wages of foreign guest workers on U.S. farms in an ostensible effort to assist the American agricultural industry as it contends with market disruptions intensified by the coronavirus pandemic.
Immigrant rights advocates said the move, first reported by NPR on Friday, would be a cruel attack on vulnerable workers who are currently risking their own health and safety to help stock U.S. grocery stores and put food on Americans' tables amid the COVID-19 outbreak.
"While immigrant farmworkers risk their lives working w/o sufficient protection during this dangerous time, this country is excluding them from federal relief packages and lobbying to lower their wages."
--Movimiento Cosecha
"This is typical Trump bullying of marginalized workers," tweeted Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.). "While farmworkers are working during a pandemic to pick the food that feeds our families during this crisis, Trump is looking to cut their pay. This is not how we should treat essential workers."
NPR reported that, at present, it is "unclear how the reforms would be made, including whether they would be taken through executive action or through the federal regulatory process."
"But Perdue has pushed for adjusting what is known as the adverse effect wage rate, which prevents farmers using the H-2A program from paying all workers--U.S. and guest workers--wages below the prevailing rates in the surrounding area," NPR reported.
Workers on the H-2A guest worker program make up an estimated 10% of the U.S. agricultural workforce.
Movimiento Cosecha, an immigrant rights group, said the Trump administration's reported plan shows that "the lives of essential workers feeding the country during this pandemic simply do not matter to the agriculture industry or to the government."
"While immigrant farmworkers risk their lives working without sufficient protection during this dangerous time, this country is excluding them from federal relief packages and lobbying to lower their wages," the group tweeted Saturday. "For immigrant workers, this is a call to action. Without our working hands, there is no labor to sustain this country--during crisis and always."
"Like other workers protesting and striking across the country," the group added, "we must use our labor to demand basic dignity and protection we deserve."
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Led by White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, the Trump administration is reportedly pushing to slash the wages of foreign guest workers on U.S. farms in an ostensible effort to assist the American agricultural industry as it contends with market disruptions intensified by the coronavirus pandemic.
Immigrant rights advocates said the move, first reported by NPR on Friday, would be a cruel attack on vulnerable workers who are currently risking their own health and safety to help stock U.S. grocery stores and put food on Americans' tables amid the COVID-19 outbreak.
"While immigrant farmworkers risk their lives working w/o sufficient protection during this dangerous time, this country is excluding them from federal relief packages and lobbying to lower their wages."
--Movimiento Cosecha
"This is typical Trump bullying of marginalized workers," tweeted Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.). "While farmworkers are working during a pandemic to pick the food that feeds our families during this crisis, Trump is looking to cut their pay. This is not how we should treat essential workers."
NPR reported that, at present, it is "unclear how the reforms would be made, including whether they would be taken through executive action or through the federal regulatory process."
"But Perdue has pushed for adjusting what is known as the adverse effect wage rate, which prevents farmers using the H-2A program from paying all workers--U.S. and guest workers--wages below the prevailing rates in the surrounding area," NPR reported.
Workers on the H-2A guest worker program make up an estimated 10% of the U.S. agricultural workforce.
Movimiento Cosecha, an immigrant rights group, said the Trump administration's reported plan shows that "the lives of essential workers feeding the country during this pandemic simply do not matter to the agriculture industry or to the government."
"While immigrant farmworkers risk their lives working without sufficient protection during this dangerous time, this country is excluding them from federal relief packages and lobbying to lower their wages," the group tweeted Saturday. "For immigrant workers, this is a call to action. Without our working hands, there is no labor to sustain this country--during crisis and always."
"Like other workers protesting and striking across the country," the group added, "we must use our labor to demand basic dignity and protection we deserve."
Led by White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue, the Trump administration is reportedly pushing to slash the wages of foreign guest workers on U.S. farms in an ostensible effort to assist the American agricultural industry as it contends with market disruptions intensified by the coronavirus pandemic.
Immigrant rights advocates said the move, first reported by NPR on Friday, would be a cruel attack on vulnerable workers who are currently risking their own health and safety to help stock U.S. grocery stores and put food on Americans' tables amid the COVID-19 outbreak.
"While immigrant farmworkers risk their lives working w/o sufficient protection during this dangerous time, this country is excluding them from federal relief packages and lobbying to lower their wages."
--Movimiento Cosecha
"This is typical Trump bullying of marginalized workers," tweeted Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.). "While farmworkers are working during a pandemic to pick the food that feeds our families during this crisis, Trump is looking to cut their pay. This is not how we should treat essential workers."
NPR reported that, at present, it is "unclear how the reforms would be made, including whether they would be taken through executive action or through the federal regulatory process."
"But Perdue has pushed for adjusting what is known as the adverse effect wage rate, which prevents farmers using the H-2A program from paying all workers--U.S. and guest workers--wages below the prevailing rates in the surrounding area," NPR reported.
Workers on the H-2A guest worker program make up an estimated 10% of the U.S. agricultural workforce.
Movimiento Cosecha, an immigrant rights group, said the Trump administration's reported plan shows that "the lives of essential workers feeding the country during this pandemic simply do not matter to the agriculture industry or to the government."
"While immigrant farmworkers risk their lives working without sufficient protection during this dangerous time, this country is excluding them from federal relief packages and lobbying to lower their wages," the group tweeted Saturday. "For immigrant workers, this is a call to action. Without our working hands, there is no labor to sustain this country--during crisis and always."
"Like other workers protesting and striking across the country," the group added, "we must use our labor to demand basic dignity and protection we deserve."
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.