The Politics of Produce · Episode 16 of 17 · 22 min
Who Picks It Now: Immigration and the H-2A Machine
Cheap, abundant food depends on a workforce the law will not fully admit. The episode runs from the Bracero Program to today's undocumented-majority workforce and the booming H-2A visa, then the 2025-26 collision of ICE raids and a fight over cutting H-2A wages. Growers, workers, and the enforcement rationale each get their strongest case.
Who's who
- Kirk E. Sherrifffederal judge hearing the UFW challenge to the H-2A wage cut
Where it happens
- Eastern District of Californiacourt hearing United Farm Workers v. Department of Labor
- California+30 more episodesstate where the unskilled H-2A wage rate fell under the new rule
Timeline
- 1942-1964Bracero Program brings Mexican laborers to U.S. farms
- 1986IRCA establishes the modern H-2A visa
- Fiscal year 2025398,258 H-2A positions certified
- 2025Labor Department splits H-2A workers into skill tiers, lowering the wage floor
- May 18, 2026judge denies a preliminary injunction against the wage rule
Still debated
Whether immigration enforcement raises domestic wages or only cuts output is unsettled, with current evidence leaning toward output loss. Whether H-2A wage floors protect workers or price them out is also contested.