The Detroit News: Harvest of hand-picked crops in Michigan in immediate peril due to Trump deportation program, prices set to rocket higher

 Editorial: Trump must act quickly to avert a harvest crisis

The immigration crisis at the southern border has been replaced by one in America's orchards and farm fields.

With harvest season about to begin in earnest, farmers are desperate for laborers to pick their fruit and vegetables. Already in the Pacific Northwest, much of the cherry crop was left to rot because of the shortage of agricultural workers.

The crisis will soon roll into Michigan, where apples, cherries, blueberries, asparagus and other crops are rapidly ripening. Hand-picked specialty crops are a $6.3 billion industry in Michigan, supporting 41,000 jobs.

The shortage of farm workers has been building for years, due to an aging agricultural workforce, competition from more lucrative and less grueling jobs and restrictions on immigrant labor.

This year, it is exacerbated by the Trump administration's crackdown on unauthorized immigrants and the deportation of those who have entered the country illegally.

Estimates are that 42% of farm workers are undocumented migrants. Recent Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids on farms employing migrants have frightened away many of those workers from the fields where they had been working.

But the work they do hasn't gone away. Fruit and vegetables still need to be harvested. If they're not, it will lead to food waste, shortages and higher prices on the grocery shelves.

When asked about the worker shortage, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said the solution lies in greater mechanization of farms and matching the 34 million able bodied Americans who must find jobs or lose their Medicaid benefits with farmers who need workers.

While Rollins is correct that those who can work should be expected to, it's doubtful even the risk of losing health care benefits will coax the jobless into hot, backbreaking farm work.

Her solutions will take time and large capital investments. They won't save this year's harvest.

The Trump administration must take emergency action to assure there are enough workers to bring in the crops this summer and fall.

Rather than deporting migrants willing to fill essential jobs such as harvesting, the administration should grant them seasonal visas and a no-deportation guarantee as long as they are working on farms.

Beyond that, reform is needed for the H-2A visa program that allows farmers to legally employ temporary workers from another country. The application process is too complex and time-consuming. It must be simplified; farmers need help now.

Also at issue is the federal mandatory minimum wage for H-2A visa holders, now set at $18.50 an hour. That's nearly $8 an hour higher than the state minimum wage in Michigan. When added to housing and other costs for these workers, many farmers have to limit their use of the visas.

Longer term, resources should be devoted to recruiting domestic workers for the agriculture industry. Farmers are also being encouraged to raise wages for native-born workers, add benefits and improve working conditions.

All of that is expensive and will inevitably show up in grocery prices. But so will the shortages caused by allowing crops to rot in fields.

The most sensible option for this season is to back off deportation of farm workers while solutions are pursued for either replacing them or giving them legal status.

Farmers and Republicans are thick as thieves with illegal aliens and sanctuary cities

It ain't just San Fran Freako, folks.

ICE Raids Dairy Farm Where Illegal Alien Accused of Killing Mollie Tibbetts Worked:

Illegal alien Cristhian Bahena-Rivera, a 24-year-old from Mexico, has been charged with first-degree murder in Tibbetts’ death after police say he admitted to confronting and chasing down the young woman. The illegal alien lived in a region of Iowa that was surrounded by sanctuary cities, as Breitbart News noted, and an initial autopsy report revealed that Bahena-Rivera allegedly stabbed Tibbetts to death. ...

That dairy farm where Bahena-Rivera worked, Yarrabee Farms, owns the property and trailer where the illegal alien had been living and which, allegedly, many Mexican nationals frequented, as Breitbart News reported.

Eric Lang, one of the chief executives of Yarrabee Farms, is the brother of Craig Lang, who was the president of the Iowa Farm Bureau. The Farm Bureau has chapters all over the United States, with the goal of increasing the number of low-skilled foreign workers, specifically those on H-2A visas, who are allowed to enter the country every year.

As Breitbart News reported, Eric Lang is also married to Nicole Schlinger, who runs the GOP fundraising firm Campaign Headquarters in Brooklyn, Iowa.

Yakima Washington Herald lets the cat out of the bag: American fruit grower rich enough to buy hotel to house foreign labor complains they make too much

Growers want more, cheaper guest workers:

Rob Valicoff is relying on 270 guest workers this year to pick his 1,700 acres of apples and pears in Wapato, nearly triple the 96 guest workers he used last year.

Under the federal H-2A guest worker program, growers are required to provide workers with housing, transportation, affordable meals and pay them higher wages.

“I’m excited now, to be honest,” he said. “Even if it costs more money, I’m excited for us not to be short of labor this year.” ...

One recent afternoon, more than 300 laborers filed into the dining hall at the former FairBridge Inn and Suites on North First Street in Yakima for dinner after a day in the fields.

Valicoff bought the 800-bed hotel and in June began housing H-2A workers from Mexico there. Some of the workers are employed by other growers, with Valicoff providing housing under an agreement with them.

Housing is free for workers, and they each pay $12.26 a day for three meals. They eat breakfast and dinner at the hotel and are provided sack lunches.

Valicoff would like to see changes that would require workers to pay a little more for meals and help with the cost of utilities.

“I think they need to pay a portion of that,” he said. “It doesn’t have to be a lot, maybe $6, $7 a day.”

He’d also like to see wages lowered for H-2A workers. The minimum wage is $14.12 an hour, above the state minimum wage of $11.50 an hour.