ICE under Trump is attacking labor rights by targeting a farmworker advocate

The Trump administration has ramped up its immigration enforcement over the last month, and claims to be targeting “the worst of the worst” for detention and deportation. However, several reports detail how U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is targeting individuals simply for exercising their right to free speech, even going as far as repealing the immigration status of those who are lawfully in the United States and removing them without any due process. Further, ICE has wrongfully detained a growing number of U.S. citizens in Trump’s crackdown on immigration.

Last week, ICE agents violently removed organizer and advocate Alfredo “Lelo” Juarez from his car while dropping his partner off at work. Juarez is well known in Washington state for fighting for farmworkers’ basic rights, such as overtime pay and protections from extreme heat. Although Juarez lacks an immigration status and had an order of removal dating back to 2018, he had no criminal record and was thus likely targeted for his work with workers’ rights organizations. He is currently being held in the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma.

Nearly half of farmworkers are undocumented immigrants according to government estimates, which means they are much more likely to be the victims of workplace violations like wage theft because they fear deportation if they speak up to defend their rights. The targeting and detention of Alfredo Juarez is a prime example of how employers and the government can exploit an individual’s immigration status to intimidate workers from exercising their right to organize as a means of improving their working conditions. We don’t know how Juarez got on ICE’s radar, but could a disgruntled and anti-union employer have called ICE and told them to look into Juarez? It’s not out of the realm of possibility—and it’s certainly a tactic that employers have at their disposal, especially now under the current White House leadership which ultimately values terrorizing immigrants rather than public safety or workers’ rights.

Immigrant workers, even those who lack immigration status or have temporary status and permission to work, are protected under U.S. labor and employment laws—at least on paper. However, many employers can violate workers’ rights with near impunity because labor standards enforcement agencies are woefully underfunded and understaffed, and there are insufficient penalties to punish those who break labor laws. For example, there are no civil monetary penalties for when employers violate workers’ rights under the National Labor Relations Act. A 2019 EPI study found that employers were charged with violating labor law in 41.5% of all union elections. Simply put, employers will use any means necessary, including legal and illegal forms of intimidation, to dissuade workers from advocating for fair pay and better working conditions.

https://www.epi.org/blog/ice-under-trump-is-attacking-labor-rights-by-targeting-a-farmworker-advocate/