This country has always had a sham relationship with the undocumented workers that keep America's agriculture, construction and hospitality industries thriving.
On the other hand, we cannot function without them. On the other hand, xenophobic politicians incite the fear and mistrust of workers in the lower economic sectors if it serves their purposes.
And voters, who can be angry about all kinds of things, often find it easier to blame outsiders for woes they have nothing to do with, like inflation.
But we can't fool ourselves: President-elect Donald Trump's promise to deport as many undocumented immigrants as possible threatens to have devastating effects on the country's economy, prices and the people who come to this country to pick our fruits and vegetables, build the country's economy. at home we washed our dishes.
California, where some economists estimate that half of our 900,000 farm workers are undocumented, could be the hardest hit.
Joe Del Bosque, 75, has grown cantaloupes, almonds and asparagus on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley for decades. During pick-up, his workforce can grow to 200 workers, none of whom are native-born and white. Some of his employees have been in the United States with “temporary protected status” for years, some have green cards and some have been able to provide documents that satisfy the organization's minimum requirements.
“Most of these jobs in agriculture are not wanted by American citizens,” Del Bosque told me on Wednesday. “And I don't blame them. It's hard work in terrible conditions that most people don't want to do for any salary.”
And, he said, the work is seasonal. Farm workers move from one crop to another based on the season.
“The people who do it go from one farm to another,” said Del Bosque. “Who can make a living in this country working for three months? It's not easy.”
The prospect of more immigration and deportations has dismayed farm workers and their managers, many of whom remember when job shortages left crops rotting in the fields as recently as 10 years ago.
“We need to come together and agree that we need some kind of immigration reform, especially for key workers,” said Del Bosque. “They provide the country with food. I can't find anything more important than that. “
In the mid-1980s, when he was in charge of the cantaloupe fields, federal government pilots would fly small planes over the state's crop area looking for large workers, he recalls. Pilots were broadcasting information about the workers, when vans full of immigration officers would raid the farms, as Del Bosque said, “capture as many as possible.”
Some of the raids he saw ended in pain. Two farm workers who escaped from the food courts jumped into the canal at the edge of the field and tried to swim.
“One didn't make it,” said Del Bosque. “He drowned right there. They took him out and he died. I remember they had a trial at Merced, and several of us came to testify about what happened. But I don't think anything ever happened about it.”
Human Rights Watch reported that from 1974 to 1986, 15 migrant farm workers are known to have drowned in Central Valley canals during immigration raids. Immigrant rights groups have accused Border Patrol agents of deliberately ambushing workers at irrigation canals, which they use as barriers to prevent escape.
Border Patrol vehicles at the time did not have life-saving equipment, “which raised sympathy, if not criminal indifference,” Human Rights Watch said. In 1984, Border Patrol officials later announced that agents would be required to carry life-saving equipment when working near rivers and canals.
Undeniably, this country's immigration system is broken. It is illegal to hire undocumented workers, but employers do it anyway because they cannot work without this official. Without exception, the government looks the other way. In fact, the chances of an employer facing an audit by immigration authorities, my colleague Don Lee recently wrote, are “far less than a taxpayer's chances of being audited by the Internal Revenue Service.”
Lee's story focuses on E-Verify, a computer-based system that allows employers to easily check the legal status of job seekers, almost immediately and for free.
The problem, as Lee reports, is that most employers won't use it. They just they don't want to know that the workers are here illegally; they really need a job.
The summer after I graduated high school, my sister got me a job waiting tables with her at a restaurant on Ventura Boulevard in Woodland Hills. The restaurant, Pages, was an upscale diner type, with a long counter, pie case and booths near the picture window at the front.
Every so often, we could hear commotion in the kitchen as the Spanish-speaking men working in the kitchen warned each other that “these migrations” – the immigration authorities – were on their way. This happened long before cell phones; I don't know whose ear was bitten.
From inside the restaurant, the boys would climb onto the roof, wait for the “all clear” and then return to busing tables, washing dishes and cooking. Those arrested and deported will return to work immediately after sneaking back across the border, which was extremely dangerous before President Reagan's 1986 amnesty and stricter border enforcement. The administrations that encouraged and favored such attempts to evade the feds generally did not face the consequences.
It was a routine, an empty dance – except it was disturbing and scary as hell.
And it will continue unless Congress corrects our incredible hypocrisy about undocumented immigrants by fixing the immigration system. It may be in Trump's best interest to keep demonizing them, but it certainly isn't ours.
Bluesky: @rabcarian.bsky.social. Threads: @rabcarian
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