ICE raids leave crops unharvested: "70% of workers are gone"

This is going to be a huge issue going forward - grocery prices are going to sky-rocket

In the vast agricultural lands north of Los Angeles, stretching from Ventura County into the state's central valley, two farmers, two field supervisors and four immigrant farmworkers told Reuters this month that the ICE raids have led a majority of workers to stop showing up.

That means crops are not being picked and fruit and vegetables are rotting at peak harvest time, they said.

One Mexican farm supervisor, who asked not to be named, was overseeing a field being prepared for planting strawberries last week. Usually he would have 300 workers, he said. On this day he had just 80. Another supervisor at a different farm said he usually has 80 workers in a field, but today just 17.

Most economists and politicians acknowledge that many of America's agricultural workers are in the country illegally, but say a sharp reduction in their numbers could have devastating impacts on the food supply chain and farm-belt economies.

Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a Republican and former director of the Congressional Budget Office, said an estimated 80% of farmworkers in the U.S. were foreign-born, with nearly half of them in the country illegally. Losing them will cause price hikes for consumers, he said.

"This is bad for supply chains, bad for the agricultural industry," Holtz-Eakin said.

Over a third of U.S. vegetables and over three-quarters of the country's fruits and nuts are grown in California, according to the California Department of Food and Agriculture. The state's farms and ranches generated nearly $60 billion in agricultural sales in 2023.

This was so absolutely 100% predicted.

Side of guac? That will be $3.99 — wait, never mind, we don’t have any this week.

[quote] [bold]Most Americans don't want to do this work[/bold]

THIS.

I don't know why these stupid fucking MAGA voters don't understand this concept.

Immigrants aren't "taking your jobs."

Immigrants are doing the jobs that you and your kids DON'T WANT TO FUCKING DO!

It’s insane

All hail Dear Leader Trump's Great Leap Forward!

It's by design. All the corporate agriculture concerns will be able to buy these farms for a song and jack up pollution and runoff to kill us all. And a couple people will make money on the stock market

Curtis & Shaleen looking forward to $50 a carton strawberries and $20 a jar baby food.

Or $100 for a pack of cigarettes.

Still a firm believer in the FAFO Principle.

Easy solution: all those unemployed MAGAts in dying rust belt and coal mining towns should head out to the fields for some stoop labor and an honest day's work. Win-win, right, MAGA?

^^^The Chinese already posted an AI video of that, r11.

As fat, old and medicated as most maggots are, they wouldn't be able to bend over to reach any crops. Their guts are in the way

Why not round up a bunch of those incel losers from basements and make them do this work instead?

R12, ha, good one. Those basement dwellers could use some good 'ol sunshine and exercise. It might give them some length of muscle they lack.

Yep, I think Trump should conscript all of his Gen Z fanboys to go pick crops.

I'm guessing Trump and the MAGAts will make sure those who able-bodied and receiving Medicaid will be the ones pickin' dem bales.

Why did you vote for orange.

I work in Ventura county.

There are a lot of MAGATS. Even the farm owners— inexplicably— are MAGATS.

So, this is working out very well for them.

You know it's bad when ICE agents are chasing down strawberry field workers. Because all those immigrant drug lord kingpins a la Scarface purposely throw off the feds by working the fields during the day (double eye roll)

🎶 Strawberry fields forever 🎶

Even Poodles are smarter.

I think Trump should deploy ICE, the National Guard and Marines to the farms. Half a Summer doing some actual work might teach these idiots a lesson.

This is Project 2025-get rid of the brown people and make the Medicaid poors do the work. Do the Project 2025 architects not know that MAGAts are fat, lazy, and drug addicted? They make for terrible workers-just ask Springfield, Ohio (DERE EATING DA CATS, DERE EATING DA DAWGS!) how that worked out for them. It's why they had to import Haitians to work those jobs.

Those ICE slobs can’t bend over, either, as most of them are domestic terrorists from Meal Team 6.

That’s why they gave to lay in wait for immigrants to show up - no way could those bloated toads run anyone down.

[quote] I think Trump should deploy ICE, the National Guard and Marines to the farms. Half a Summer doing some actual work might teach these idiots a lesson.

Many of the ICE agents are also Mexican, so this should work out quite well for them...

R17 - yes - I was going to say - how many in Ventura voted for this?

But I thought there were migrant Visas for people every year. The work Visas where they come in for season, pick all the crops, then return back to Mexico. I know a lot do this.

Of course, some stayed and didn't go back.

Didn't Florida already go through this a few months ago?

I just watched that new American Apparel documentary on Netflix, and that company went tits-up after ICE raided their LA manufacturing facility and deported all of the illegal workers. Now extrapolate that nationwide...

R25, the migrant visa program still exists but first you need it to work effectively (Trump made staffing cuts there) and then you need migrants to trust it enough to be willing to uproot their lives and try to use it. The fear and doubt and mistrust today among Latino migrants is of course several orders of magnitude greater under Trump 2.0 than it was under previous administrations.

When the food starts to run out, some idiotic "Marsha" (as in Blackburn) is going to call on us all to plant "MAGA Gardens" in our back yards, like it was 1943,

R27 - but where are they and how are they surviving? I presume they don't have a ton of cash saved up.

Shady Vance is all set to profit when the farms sell on AcreTrader (AKA Acre Traitor).

R29 they are probably going poor(er) staying where they are. I know somebody who works with migrant communities.. the stories and images of random Hispanic males kidnapped and thrown into CECOT for life — and especially the prison images — went everywhere and went deep.

We finally signed up for a CSA share, because I would rather support my local farmer than big corporations. I also now have to find a recipe for garlic scapes, as that was one of the things available, Saturday. We'll be doing the same for meat and poultry. It costs about 20 percent more and takes more work to plan out meals, because you get what's available week to week, but I am happy to have these options.

If all these folks gettin gpbmint handouts want to eat so bad, have them go out in the fields and pick it right off the vines. Nothing fresher than hand picked.

Problem solved. Y'all can thank me later.

Half of all fruits and vegetables are grown in California - this is going to be a real problem soon.

You never hear anything about the people who illegally EMPLOYED these immigrants being charged with anything. I wonder why?

Because the laws are written that way, R35 at thei direction. Employers are shown documents by workers but have no obligation to investigate whether or not the documents are real.

Employers are for the most part white. The workers are for the most part brown. I trust that’s the reason why.

Part of the chaos plan. He already tried to throw out millions of votes in swing states that he lost. He demanded that his VP refuse to certify the election outcome. He incited people to kill his opposition including the aforementioned VP! He is threatening long standing alliances and threatening to invade friendly countries. He bombed Iran and is literally egging them on to respond so that he can do more despite his promises to his core base regarding war. He is sending troops to Blue states/cities, attacking universities and building concentration camps. Contrary to belief, he welcomes protests with the hope of violence and would love nothing more to declare a state of emergency by executive order suspending the elections and his rule indefinitely. He is the ULTIMATE narcissist. NO amount of money or hookers can give him the same high as the ULTIMATE power. Been there, done that. He absolutely wants to be The Daddy of the world by any means possible and HE will never ever go away quietly....if he is Alive despite what some of you bitches post. Even the constitution is subject to interpretation thanks to Clarence fucking Thomas

The Immigration Reform & Control Act of 1986 made it illegal for employers to knowingly hire undocumented workers.

“Knowingly” R38

"Most Americans don't want to do this work" is doublespeak for "backbreaking work that doesn't offer a decent wage, decent work conditions, decent hours, health insurance, job security, or any other kind of benefit" It's bad enough that even the minimum wage workers won't take it.

The first answer to "Most Americans don't want to do this work" must always be "what does it pay?" It is always bottom line: that's where the jobs went overseas when they were allowed to be outsourced, and where the farm worker jobs went. George and Lenny from Of Mice and Men would be Jorge and Leonardo today.

Not to worry. They’ll be turned out in chain gangs as slave labor for corporate farms and taxpayers will pay them. That will work out quite well for billionaires. And you’ll get your guacamole again.

Hmmm. That’s actually a plausible result.

The “illegals” at “AlligatorTrazz” awaiting deportation to El Salvador, might be given the “option” to stay in the U.S., closer to their families, in return for supervised picking of Florida oranges for prison wages . . .

Why do people suppose that this is an unintended consequence.

This is and has always been the plan.

Nothing causes civil unrest and fear for safety than food shortages. In turn, "Emergency" powers, suspension of rights and personal liberties, then even when the "crisis" is over, our rights continue to be reduced - see 9/11, Patiot Act, and everything detailed in the Snowden leaks.

This food Youtuber made a really good video on this subject.

There's always ..

"Most Americans don't want to do this work" is doublespeak for "backbreaking work that doesn't offer a decent wage, decent work conditions, decent hours, health insurance, job security, or any other kind of benefit" It's bad enough that even the minimum wage workers won't take it.": Some years back, there were writers who tried to shame Americans for not working these jobs, however these same writers now realize that asking for a decent wage isn't a form of entitlement.

[quote] Ventura County, California, an area that produces billions of dollars worth of fruit and vegetables each year, much of it hand-picked by immigrants in the U.S. illegally.

Does anyone care to comment on this?

R47 there was no lettuce at Walmart today

I forgot to add, I don't want to say this is the problem, but it kind of is the problem.

How are so many people here illegally?

Personally, I don't care, but it does seem to bean issue.

Apparently the MAGA farmers are quite confused why black people aren't offering to step up to do farm work.

(as spotted on online forums)

You know damn well *somebody* is gonna be doing this work for free at the business end of a gun.

It's a friggin' misdemeanor, r49.

But what are the egg prices there, R48?

Let’s hope the domestic terrorists aka ICE starve to death first.

Apparently there are 4 million unauthorized Mexican immigrants in the US. That's over 1% of our population. A third of those are just in California - over 1.3 million.

That's a huge amount - and presumably most are working.

Next up: raiding janitorial jobs.

So what’s the plan? Is child labor going to make a comeback?

[quote]Next up: raiding janitorial jobs.

Supposedly they're hitting car washes in the LA area.

I imagine the L.A. garment industry is taking a heavy hit.

For R55. Sadly, it’s happened.

The janitor had been working here for decades, zero crime, and is beloved by the NJ synagogue that employed him. He was at his asylum interview. That new evil Catch-22 that ICE has been pulling: possibly get deported if you show, definitely get criminalized further if you don’t.

The business model changed. U.S. farmers will just turn to crops that can be planted grown and picked with machines. Those that have to be managed by hand will become very expensive and more production will be pushed to Mexico or further south for growing. The produce will then be imported to the U.S. for selling. It will create lots of low paying jobs to the south of the border the same jobs that paid a lot more in the USA. Corporations are ten years ahead of the government typically and they saw this coming years ago. It is likely the cartels and the U.S. corporates set up production south of the border in anticipation. It is a win, win. Cartels get a legitimate income and corporates get access to cheap labor.

Americans not wanting to do this work shouldn’t be a reason for the performative, NIMBY virtue-signalers to wring their hands lamenting about the poor undocumented immigrants being targeted, harassed and in the right. Do Americans want the undocumented to be allowed to stay here for a better life, or because Americans want the illegals to continue in their feudal-like harvesting duties so that Karen, Clayden, Brayden and Zach can get their tofu and organic rotisserie chickens on-schedule at Whole Foods?!

[QUOTE]U.S. farmers will just turn to crops that can be planted grown and picked with machines

Which crops those besides grains and soybeans? Are you saying delicate fruits and vegetables can be harvested with a combine?

I went to college in a town surrounded by vegetable fields (mostly tomatoes) and orchards of all types. The nut crops were the only ones harvested by machines. But the orchards require a lot of human maintenance.

^ are those

Ugh. I've been going on a word ommission binge.

I forgot to mention there were/are a lot of sugar beet fields. Those are also machine harvested.

More than ten percent of California’s agricultural production, by value, is grapes and wine.

Napa and Sonoma’s Cabernet grapes aren’t going to get picked by Dee’s kids.

And you can’t grow those delicious California and Oregon Pinot in Mexico.

I once read that by 2050 the world's need for meat will be so huge that you'd have to grow cattle in skyscraper-type structures.

And they want people to have more kids?

There will be change in what Americans eat. Crops that require manual harvesting will go away, or be only for the rich. Machine harvested crops will fill the void. There’s also the possibility that like with so many foods that we eat, new versions of crops that are manually harvested will be engineered to allow for machine harvesting,

[quote]Ugh. I've been going on a word ommission binge.

But you make up for it by adding extra letters.

I sure never backed down on a dirty job if it paid a living wage. Americans would do the work if it paid a living wage with benefits. But oh no, managers, stockholders, and billionaires won’t get their cut. How about we pay American labor the same salary and benefits that Congress gets to vote for themselves?!

Problem solved!

[quote]I sure never backed down on a dirty job if it paid a living wage.

Do tell, R69! I'd love to hear about the "dirty jobs" you've done.

How dirty were they?

R69, no they wouldn’t.

R36: I believe those documents are sent on for verification, no?

Do they want to sabotage the economy? And the government along with it? This scenario is straight out of Steve Bannon’s playbook. Destroy the government and rebuild it from scratch.

The poors won't revolt, even when Walmart's produce section runs dry.

Their fat orange god will convince them it's all Gyna's fault, and they'll believe it right into starvation.

Stupid fucking country.

horrible - atrocious in face

Hire new people then?

R13 Stop mewing, start picking! You’ll have a “Chad” body in no time!

Let dem eat cak

I was once lectured to by a MAGA Karen about $20 bags of grapes (which never existed) because of regulations (like food inspections).

That bitch will really get her $20 bag of grapes now thanks to her orange Jesus.

A lot of Americans are just praying that this doesn't affect Mountain Dew and Doritos production. As long as it doesn't, they're good with real food not getting produced.

[quote] A lot of Americans are just praying that this doesn't affect Mountain Dew and Doritos production

I think that's a Southern thing.

Let them eat roadkill.

Actually, quite a few of them already do.

[quote]Crops that require manual harvesting will go away, or be only for the rich.

A healthy balanced diet is only for 1% of the population. When undernourished people starve to death and there are no more consumers, let alone workers, it'll all be just fine.

I agree with what everyone is saying but a few things

People keep confusing indifference with MAGA, and it’s a huge blind spot in political discourse.

The truth is, the majority of Americans aren’t MAGA, and they’re not woke either — they’re checked out. They’re not watching the news, not voting, not organizing. They’re just trying to survive: paying rent, getting the kids to school, figuring out how to afford groceries or gas.

When politically active people see someone not engaging, they assume it’s opposition — but most of the time, it’s just exhaustion, cynicism, or apathy. Not everyone has the energy to turn every issue into an identity.

Most people aren’t against change — they just don’t believe anything will actually change. And if you want to build coalitions or win hearts, you’ve got to stop talking like everyone’s already on the battlefield. Some folks are just in the stands, waiting to see if any of this matters to them.

I think we’re missing something when we say “Americans don’t want to do farm work.” A lot of working-class Americans don’t even know they can.

Farm labor isn’t just undesirable — it’s practically invisible. Most people outside of rural areas have no idea how to even apply for that kind of job. It’s not on job boards. It’s not at job fairs. It’s not something schools talk about. There’s no hiring center with a banner that says “Strawberry Pickers Needed — $15/hr.”

The whole system runs on word-of-mouth inside tight-knit immigrant labor networks. Unless you’re already in that loop, you won’t even know where to show up.

It’s also been culturally marked as “immigrant work.” That’s not about racism — it’s just how the narrative evolved. Farming used to be a working-class job for Americans too, but now it’s seen as something done by others. Entire generations have grown up without ever thinking of it as a real employment option.

So it’s not always that Americans won’t do the work. Sometimes, they don’t even know it’s there to be done.

I went to high school in s small town in the south. I knew people in high school (teenagers) who picked peaches in the summer. Those jobs paid a lot better than my babysitting jobs, but I’m sure it was miserable work.

My (estranged) grandfather was a farmer who grew tobacco, among other things. He had a second family with a son about my age. I remember hearing that his son had tried picking tobacco as a summer job, but didn’t last very long.

This was all 40-45 years ago. I’m sure that doesn’t exist any more.

[quote]they don’t even know it’s there to be done.

There was a farmer in California's Central Valley that posted harvest picking jobs on Craigslist with a starting wage of $25 an hour. He did not receive a single application despite the fact that unemployment in his county is in the double digits. The farmer reported that all any applicant had to do was show up; there was no interview, no resume necessary, and there were no job requirements aside from being able to pick fruit.

Is it too much to ask an unemployed person to scan a common job board for available work?

And now you're blaming this on migrants who keep all the good jobs to themselves?

"Do they want to sabotage the economy?"

Possibly. Rethuglians thrive on crime, poverty, chaos and anarchy (as long as they themselves are cloistered behind gated communities).

[quote]Let them eat roadkill. Actually, quite a few of them already do.

including our Secretary of Health & Human Services! It can't be all bad!

[quote]I once read that by 2050 the world's need for meat will be so huge that you'd have to grow cattle in skyscraper-type structures. And they want people to have more kids?

Actually Africa is the only part of the world where the population is still steadily increasing. Even in India and China they're having so few children that the population will start declining soon.

[quote]Even in India and China they're having so few children that the population will start declining soon.

China is believed to have overcounted their most recent census by up to 100 million people.

I’m not talking dirty porn stuff if that’s what it’s about R71. I shoveled dog, horse, human shit for a living. I’ve worked on car assembly lines in a 1935 building, day labor, and psycho wards. Except for the car assembly, they were minimum wage jobs, or just over.

Won’t big agri get mad?