The H-2A program, which issues temporary visas to foreign nationals seeking agricultural employment, began as an emergency measure to address a nationwide shortage of farm workers. It has since undergone considerable expansion.
Last month, the Trump Administration implemented new policies that lowered the prevailing wage rate and, for the first time in the program’s history, permitted growers to deduct rent from workers’ wages. These changes are expected to depress wages for all farmworkers across the nation, effectively transferring funds into growers’ pockets.
Local workers interviewed in Washington state over the past year indicate they do not fault H-2A workers for coming to farms. They recognize that growers prefer this arrangement due to federal grants and a desire for a controlled, dependent workforce.
As the Trump administration intensifies ICE raids nationwide, expanding the H-2A visa program cannot serve as a solution for protecting our agriculture sector. The H-2A program was established as a last resort for farms facing a deficit of willing and able local workers. However, its growth has been rapid. In 2024, the program’s expansion reached an unprecedented level, negatively impacting farmworkers.
Washington State has experienced some of the most significant H-2A expansion nationally and has quickly become the preferred labor force for growers over the last decade. In Washington, H-2A usage has surged since 2008. Last year, a considerable number of H-2A workers arrived on Washington farms. These workers now constitute approximately 30% of the state’s farm labor and nearly 10% of all H-2A workers nationwide.
H-2A operates within the same colonial legacy as earlier guest worker initiatives, like the Mexican guest worker project, the Bracero program, and is rife with worker exploitation. H-2A workers, hailing from rural communities in Mexico, Jamaica, and Central America, frequently encounter deceptive recruitment practices, poor working environments, and substandard living conditions. They often remain silent due to fear of reprisal, blacklisting, and the risk of not being rehired the following year.
H-2A guest workers are typically housed on rural farms away from city centers, with growers and labor contractors exercising control over their mobility. To further isolate them, H-2A workers are discouraged from establishing roots in the communities where they work and are spatially segregated from local workers on farms.
However, the negative impacts are not limited to H-2A workers. The expanded use of the program displaces local workers, with women disproportionately affected.
I recently spoke with a local farmworker who was seeking employment on a hops and apples farm just outside Sunnyside, Wash. The farm supervisor indicated they were not looking to hire women. Amid similar complaints, the organization is now suing the farm for allegedly discriminating against local workers and replacing them with H-2A workers. This lawsuit mirrors an earlier case against another entity, which also faced accusations of discriminating against women workers, firing them all and substituting them with male H-2A guest workers in 2021.
While women face increasing difficulties in finding work, all local farmworkers are experiencing displacement and fear that if the H-2A program continues to grow, job opportunities for any of them may vanish within the next few years.
Sunnyside is a farming town in southern Washington State with approximately 16,000 residents, 86% of whom are Latinx. This small farmworker community has become the epicenter of farmworker displacement, as more growers bring in large numbers of H-2A workers, compelling local workers out of agriculture. Familias Unidas Por La Justicia, an independent farmworker union in Washington, estimates that nearly 85% of the local farmworkers are undocumented immigrants from Mexico. These workers initially welcomed the arrival of H-2A workers because H-2A workers are paid at a state-mandated rate that is more than what local workers previously earned, and employers must offer local workers the same pay.
However, that initial optimism has since deteriorated into a difficult situation. As more H-2A workers flood Washington farms, many operations are now significantly overstaffed, with local workers struggling to find jobs.
As ICE raids targeting local farmworkers persist across the country in states like New York, Vermont, and California, it becomes imperative to consider how we can support all the workers who provide food for our tables. Mass deporting our local farmworkers is not the answer; they deserve to live and work with dignity. But expanding H-2A similarly fails to provide a viable solution.
Instead, the millions of dollars allocated to this program should be reinvested in supporting comprehensive immigration reform for all immigrants already residing in this country. Simultaneously, there is a need for amnesty for all immigrants in this country, alongside genuine reforms for the H-2A guest worker program that protect workers from employer abuses and exploitation.
Farmworkers are the backbone of this country. Should the H-2A program continue to expand at its current rate, the local farmworker communities that have historically built rural America may disappear. We owe them a more promising future.