Immigration/Labor Rights
"Jail the Illegals and Lower the Wages of the Legals"
Written by Bruce Goldstein Saturday, 24 May 2008 09:42
The Bush Administration's last quarter is being marked by a significant change in approach to immigration policy. It could be summed up as "jail the illegals and lower the wages of the legals."
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) bureau raided a Postville, Iowa meatpacking plant and won prison terms for 270 of the undocumented workers who had been working up to 14 hours a day, often without being paid properly. Their crime? Working under fraudulent documents. Is the Administration planning to arrest and imprison the roughly 1.35 million undocumented farmworkers in the United States? Surely not, the Administration will say; we'll only imprison the few thousand worst offenders and deport the other 1.2 million or so.
In addition to imprisoning and deporting the undocumented, the Bush Administration announced plans to change the H-2A agricultural guestworker program, which allows farmers and ranchers to hire seasonal workers on temporary work permits.
What solution does the Administration have? Lower the wage rates, eliminate housing standards, minimize recruitment U.S. workers, and remove government oversight. Why? Because, the Administration says, the employers will hire guestworkers instead of undocumented workers if we make it cheaper to hire guestworkers.
Where does this lead us? It leads us to a government policy that tells agricultural employers that they may set their wage rates and other job terms under the H-2A program at the levels that undocumented workers would accept. While this might create an incentive to hire guestworkers instead of undocumented workers, it also allows employers to avoid hiring US workers who would work for higher wages and better benefits.
This, of course, is not only unfair to U.S. workers but is illegal. The immigration law says that the guestworker program's wages and working conditions should be set so that U.S. citizens and lawful resident immigrants are not adversely affected.
The Bush Administration's approach is so ludicrous that it is being criticized not only by worker advocates like us but by many agricultural employers with whom we disagree on almost every other point.
The answer is the AgJOBS legislation that has been sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Sen. Larry Craig, Sen. Edward Kennedy, Rep. Howard Berman, Rep. Chris Cannon and others. AgJOBS would grant a temporary legal status to qualified undocumented farmworkers and would grant them the opportunity to earn permanent immigration status. AgJOBS, which was negotiated by the United Farm Workers and the major agribusiness groups, also would revise the H-2A agricultural guestworker program in balanced ways that both workers and employers can live with.
Since AgJOBS, due to its path to permanent immigration status is controversial, the major players have agreed on a temporary fix called the Emergency Agriculture Relief Act, which would not provide a path to a green card, but only temporary resident status, and would expire in 5 years, until these issues can be dealt with on a more compehensive basis.
Something needs to be done now. The majority of farmworkers are undocumented. If they left, agriculture would be decimated. Conditions for farmworkers need to be improved, not worsened. The Bush Administration's twin approach of jail and sweatshops is cold-hearted and counterproductive. We need a farm labor force that is productive and treated decently. Congress should step in now and address this urgent situation in a responsible, practical manner.
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