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Donald Trump appeared to concede that his aggressive anti-immigration campaign is debilitating American farmers and hotel businesses, marking a rare public admission that his promise of the “largest deportation operation in American history” comes at a significant cost.
“Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace,” the president wrote on Truth Social on Thursday.
The president’s comments follow a series of workplace raids targeting farm workers in southern California, a meat production plant in Nebraska and dairy farm workers in Vermont, among other operations affecting multi-billion dollar industries that employ tens of thousands of undocumented people.
More than 40 percent of the nation’s crop workers are undocumented, according to estimates from the Department of Agriculture. Foreign-born workers make up as much as 90 percent of meat processing and dairy workers in some states.
More than 1 million undocumented people worked across the hospitality industry — including hotels and restaurants — making up more than 7 percent of the workforce, according to an analysis of 2020 data by legal advocacy group American Immigration Council.
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Recent federal labor data showed the size of the nation’s workforce was shrinking last month, partially due to the largest and ongoing decline of foreign-born workers in the labor force since 2020.
In Thursday’s Truth Social post, Trump shifted former President Joe Biden for “criminals” who are now “applying for those jobs” and pushing others out.
“This is not good. We must protect our Farmers, but get the CRIMINALS OUT OF THE USA. Changes are coming!” Trump wrote.
It is unclear what those changes would be and when they will arrive. In a statement to The Independent, assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin said the agency “will follow the President’s direction and continue to work to get the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens off of America’s streets.”
In April, the president suggested that undocumented people working on farms and in hotels would be allowed to leave the country and return as legal workers if their employers could vouch for them.
“We have to take care of our farmers, the hotels and, you know, the various places where they tend to, where they tend to need people,” he said during a cabinet meeting in April.
“So a farmer will come in with a letter concerning certain people, saying they’re great, they’re working hard,” he added. “We’re going to slow it down a little bit for them, and then we’re going to ultimately bring them back. They’ll go out. They’re going to come back as legal workers.”
His latest statement follows the administration’s ramped-up immigration enforcement efforts across the country, including raids and sweeping arrests that sparked recent protests in Los Angeles and elsewhere.
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The administration has revoked legal status for tens of thousands of immigrants, and immigration judges have been instructed to drop cases for hundreds of others, making potentially millions of people vulnerable to arrest and swift removal from the country.
White House policy chief Stephen Miller, the architect of the president’s anti-immigration platform, has put pressure on Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials to arrest 3,000 people a day. He reportedly told officials to “just go out there and arrest illegal aliens.”
Viral footage from a farm raid in Oxnard, California this week shows federal agents and a speeding white van chasing workers through a field of crops.
“These actions are completely unjustified and harmful,” Oxnard Mayor Luis McArthur said in a statement. “They create chaos and distress in our community without contributing much to public safety.”
People targeted in those raids are “hardworking families who make meaningful contributions to our local economy and to our greater community,” he said.
The state’s two Democratic senators Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff are “deeply alarmed” by reports of workplace raids in the state.
“California is the nation’s largest agricultural state, and without the people who work through harsh conditions — extreme heat, cold weather, or pouring rain — feeding the nation would be impossible, and putting food on the table would be much more expensive for American families,” they said in a statement.
“While the Trump Administration repeatedly claims it is focused on violent criminals and gangs, their draconian actions tell a different story,” the senators added. “Targeting hardworking farm workers and their families who have been doing the backbreaking work in the fields for decades is unjustified and unconscionable.”
The United Farm Workers union said the Oxnard raid and similar actions in Ventura, Kern and Tulare counties amount to “an attack on Californians and a dangerous waste of resources.”
“Indiscriminate raids and chaotic sweeps put public safety at risk,” the group said.
Immigration agents also arrested at least 100 people at an Omaha meat production plant this week.
At least 74 people remain in custody, according to the Center for Immigrant and Refugee Advancement advocacy group.
