Do you like veggies and fruits? If so, who do you believe will harvest the more than 300 crops grown in California next year, including oranges, almonds, lettuce, strawberries, tomatoes, and more?
Who will work in the Central Valley’s majority of the state’s meat industries, dairy farms, and food processing facilities?
On his first day in office in January, Republican President-elect Donald Trump vows to launch a huge deportation campaign. This is exactly why a large number of Trump supporters selected him over Democrat Kamala Harris: worries about illegal immigrants. Trump promises to remove millions of illegal immigrants from the nation. Even the ag-rich Fresno County voted for Trump for the first time.
A sobering reality is as follows: Seventy-five percent of farm laborers in California are undocumented, according to La Cooperativa, a farm worker help organization based in Sacramento. About 500,000 to 800,000 individuals live in California, home to between one-third and half of all farm workers in the United States. The American Immigration Council estimates that there are 11 million unauthorized individuals in the country overall.
Former U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement chief Tom Homan, Trump’s choice for border security, promises to lead the largest deportation campaign the nation has ever seen.
Economists claim that the undocumented labor force, which performs hard labor in a variety of businesses, is the reason America thrives.
The majority of workers in forestry, fishing and hunting, landscaping, and agriculture are noncitizens, according to an email from Ana Padilla, executive director of UC Merced’s Community and Labor Center. Furthermore, noncitizens make up around half of the workforce in the animal production industry. Noncitizens make up one-third of the food processing workforce. Additionally, noncitizens make up almost one-fourth of food service employees.
Three-quarters of the country’s fruits and nuts, as well as one-third of its vegetables, are grown in California. Farmers in California need laborers to plant, care for, and harvest their crops.
Thus, the following guidance is for the incoming Congress and the president-elect: Give farmworkers and others in associated businesses a legal status, such as a deportation exemption. Otherwise, Americans’ reliance on the food supply will be jeopardized.
Americans without jobs have repeatedly demonstrated that they are unwilling to perform the labor-intensive field labor or assembly-line slaughter of meat plants that foreigners are willing to perform.
Food supply
What negative effects might widespread farm worker deportations have? First, the cost of food has increased.
Any crop that is selected will become more valued and hence more expensive when it eventually reaches the grocery store if a farmer is unable to complete harvesting it because of a labor shortage.
Additionally, Americans will probably have to rely on imported produce. Other nations’ growers will perceive a chance to increase prices. A low-cost food production system centered on domestically farmed produce has long been advantageous to America. Costs will increase and national security would be jeopardized if the US begins to rely on other nations for its food.
The economy of Fresno County is mostly reliant on agriculture. With $8.5 billion in gross revenues in 2023, the county is among the fastest-growing areas in the country.
Another high-performing county is Tulare County, which is located just to the south and generated $7.9 billion in gross sales in 2023.
In the Central Valley, damage to crops would have far-reaching effects. The Valley economy is based on farming, from the sale of equipment to the supply of chemicals to specialized services like field leveling and irrigation to secondary sectors like tool shops, apparel stores, and even dining establishments.
Costly deportations
The American Immigration Council estimates that carrying out Trump’s promised deportations would cost the federal budget enormous sums of money.
According to the council’s estimate, which was based on government data, deporting one million individuals in the first year would cost $88 billion, the most of which would go toward building detention facilities.
It would cost $315 billion if Trump’s objective was to expel all of America’s undocumented citizens, of which the council estimates there will be 11 million by 2022. Realistically, it would take ten years to execute the massive deportation that Homan had in mind.
According to the council, illegal individuals paid $29.3 billion in state taxes and $46.8 billion in federal taxes in 2022. Undocumented workers paid $5.7 billion to Medicare and $22.6 billion to Social Security. In addition to not receiving benefits, undocumented workers would lose their earnings in the event of deportations.
Farm economy at risk
The specifics of Trump’s pledge to deport people are still up for debate. However, Trump and Congress need to find ways to give workers legal status or exemptions when it comes to agriculture and our food supply. The food we so often take for granted will either become more costly or just unavailable unless that changes.
Additionally, there will be no more service personnel to maintain society’s flawless operation.
Did you mean that, Trump supporters?
Democrat Rep. Jim Costa (Fresno) and newly re-elected Republican Reps. Vince Fong (Bakersfield-Clovis) and David Valadao (Hanford) ought to work together in a bipartisan endeavor to establish legal status or exemptions for agricultural workers in order to prevent their deportation.
Otherwise, the Central Valley will have to deal with a significantly diminished economy and farmers and dairy proprietors will suffer unheard-of labor shortages.
Editor of the editorial page for the Fresno Bee is Tad Weber.
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