Here’s the start of what may be a great lesson that can save our lives and our planet, and also improve our quality-of-life experience. Autocratic leaders in history have needed a group to pick on. In his first term, Trump advocated against Muslims, even though the crimes he cited were committed by white males. This time, it’s immigrants. The problem is, our country was built by people who were “down and out” in their native land and came here for the opportunity to build a better life. They took whatever work they could find and wanted their children to get a good education and have a better life.
After two or three generations, immigrant groups had college degrees and a cadre of educated leaders. The “McFarland, USA” film is an excellent depiction of our acculturation process. Today, our population has a much higher percent of college graduates than any other country. That’s what actually makes our country great. As this report indicates, going after immigrants who produce our food sustainability is like shooting ourselves in the foot.
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Immigration Raids Leave Crops Unharvested,
California Farms at Risk
Tim Reid, Sebastian Rocandio,
Pilar Olivares, Leah Douglas
Reuters
June 30, 2025
OXNARD, CA. Lisa Tate is a sixth-generation farmer in 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.
Tate knows the farms around her well. And she says she can see with her own eyes how raids carried out by agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the area’s fields earlier this month, part of President Donald Trump’s migration crackdown, have frightened off workers. She said in an interview …
“In the fields, I would say 70% of the workers
are gone. If 70% of your workforce doesn’t show
up, 70% of your crop doesn’t get picked and
can go bad in one day. Most Americans don’t
want to do this work. Most farmers here are
barely breaking even. I fear this has created
a tipping point where many will go bust.”
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.
BAD FOR BUSINESS
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. Holtz-Eakin also said …
“This is bad for supply chains,
bad for the agricultural industry.”
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.
Of the four immigrant farmworkers Reuters spoke to, two are in the country illegally. These two spoke on the condition of anonymity, out of fear of being arrested by ICE.
One, aged 54, has worked in U.S. agricultural fields for 30 years and has a wife and children in the country. He said most of his colleagues have stopped showing up for work. He said …
“If they show up to work, they don’t know
if they will ever see their family again.”
The other worker in the country illegally told Reuters …
“Basically, we wake up in the morning scared.
We worry about the sun, the heat, and now a
much bigger problem – many not returning home.
I try not to get into trouble on the street. Now,
whoever gets arrested for any reason gets deported.”
To be sure, some farmworker community groups said many workers were still returning to the fields, despite the raids, out of economic necessity.
The days following a raid may see decreased attendance in the field, but the workers soon return because they have no other sources of income, five groups told Reuters.
Workers are also taking other steps to reduce their exposure to immigration agents, like carpooling with people with legal status to work or sending U.S. citizen children to the grocery store, the groups said.
ICE CHILL
Trump conceded in a post on his Truth Social account this month that ICE raids on farm workers – and also hotel workers – were “taking very good, long-time workers away” from those sectors, “with those jobs being almost impossible to replace.” Trump later told reporters …
“Our farmers are being hurt badly. They have
very good workers. They’re not citizens,
but they’ve turned out to be great.”
He pledged to issue an order to address the impact, but no policy change has yet been enacted.
Trump has always stood up for farmers, said White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly in response to a request for comment on the impact of the ICE raids to farms. She said …
“He will continue to strengthen our agricultural
industry and boost exports while keeping his
promise to enforce our immigration laws.”
Bernard Yaros, Lead U.S. Economist at Oxford Economics, a nonpartisan global economics advisory firm, said in a report published on June 26 that native-born workers tend not to fill the void left by immigrant workers who have left. He said …
“Unauthorized immigrants tend to work
in different occupations than those
who are native-born.”
ICE operations in California’s farmland were scaring even those who are authorized, said Greg Tesch, who runs a farm in central California. Tesch said …
“Nobody feels safe when they hear the word
ICE, even the documented people. We know
that the neighborhood is full of a combina-
tion of those with and without documents.
“If things are ripe, such as our neighbors
have bell peppers here, (if) they don’t har-
vest within two or three days, the crop is
sunburned or over mature. We need the labor.”
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Big picture … in a “zero-sum” situation, if I win, you lose; we must compete to survive. There’s only one Super Bowl winner each year. However, in a non-zero-sum situation, we can all win. If my kids get better grades than I did, great. If they get better jobs and make more money than me, great. We can both win. Now the catch:
Competitive behaviors in a non-zero-sum
situation invariably yield a lose-lose outcome.
If I mislead classmates so my test scores beat theirs, I destroy trust, which will come back to haunt me before the next exam. If I’m angry that my son makes more money than me, that can destroy family trust. And if I point a blaming finger at farmers – a group with whom I’m not competing – I may end up going hungry!
I want America to be great; why not? But making us “first” suggests we’re competing in a non-zero-sum environment. Other countries can be great in their own way; if nations, like family members, help one another, both win.
Ukraine’s asset is agriculture. (If you’ve not been there, it’s like Kansas, with slight rolling hills and a perfect climate for growing grains.) They sell grains to a huge percent of the entire African continent. But Russia, instead of trading – such as their natural gas for Ukraine’s grain – took a competitive tack. And a win-lose tactic in a non-zero-sum situation yields a lose-lose outcome. Both are devastated economically, with people living in fear.
Trump’s background is commercial development. His properties compete with others in limited market environments that require zero-sum competitive behavior; beating a rival is needed to survive. However, attacking a group – such as immigrants doing legitimate work, in a non-zero-sum environment, as we can use all the food we can produce – yields a lose-lose outcome.
Expect food shortages and higher prices for what is available.
