We’ve been seeing the relentless march of ICE officials toward San Luis Obispo.
First, they hunted undocumented workers in Los Angeles, then Oxnard, Ventura, and Carpinteria.
The workers that they are hunting are essential to our economy, often doing vital yet low-paying jobs. What’s more, they are protected by the U.S. Constitution. The Fifth Amendment clearly states: “No person shall … be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” The courts have affirmed that “person” applies to everyone on U.S. soil, not just citizens. Even Founding Father James Madison stated that non-citizen “aliens,” since they are obligated to obey the laws of the Constitution, “are entitled, in return, to their protection and advantage.”
Even if one thinks that entering the United States illegally and working here is a crime that merits deportation, those workers are legally entitled to due process, with a trial and the full protection of the U.S. legal system, just like anybody else.
George R. Hansen
Arroyo Grande
This article appears in Jul 17-27, 2025.
George:
“…are essential to our economy, often doing vital yet low-paying jobs.”
The jobs you are referring to are “low paying” because the employers always have a willing pool of (illegal) labor willing to accept continuously lower paying work. Tighten the labor pool and wages will rise. These (illegal) immigrants have also reduced the wages of the skilled labor involved in the building trades.
When wages inevitably rise due to a tightening pool of (legal) labor, I don’t think you’ll see too many tears shed. This will also help raise taxe revenue for our government and decrease or at least slow the rate of our taxes. You should be cheering for deportations. Lastly, the feds need to prosecute the companies dodging their taxes by knowingly hiring this army of illegal labor.
Eliminating undocumented farm workers will not raise wages on a widespread basis. A farm worker in California makes, on average, about $24 an hour. And about a third of them have employee provided health insurance. Some farmers may indeed raise wages, but much past $25-$30 an hour will force many small business farms to fold up, leaving the land to corporate interests who will not increase wages because they will do what the industrial sector of this nation has already done in the face of rising wages, automate.
For about a half-million dollars a large corporate farm who has taken over a tomato or lettuce or cauliflower or broccoli field will employ robotic harvesters which can take the place of an army of pickers. Those college trained technicians who run them might make $40-$50 an hour but you only need one or two. Strawberries and other more fragile produce is trickier because it tends to bruise, but as the technology rolls forward this will be figured out. In the meantime, corporate farmers will simply increase their prices or move to Mexico and pay the tariffs, making already expensive produce much higher. Not only that but on the Central Coast, many farmers will go out of business without a reliable work force. Expecting native born Americans to pick strawberries for any wage is ludicrous.
“Expecting native born Americans to pick strawberries for any wage is ludicrous.” Nice way to insult your countrymen. You are aware actual Americans do things like mine coal, clean toilets, drive trash trucks, process medical waste, etc? To say native born Americans wont pick strawberries for $25 an hour in the cool coastal breeze is silly. You might want to revisit a basic American history book or some Steinbeck.
Wages will rise, we need to remove as many illegal aliens as possible. They have forced the price of housing up and depressed wages. Prosecute their tax dodging employers too.
It is a difficult situation. Illegals are doing the grueling work in agriculture and construction that native born Americans are unwilling to do. With our generous “safety net”, native born Americans don’t need to endure that kind of work in order to survive, and are able to manage on less challenging work. When was the last time you saw a white face working in the valley fields in 105 degree heat? The illegals work hard and are by and large a decent bunch. Still, we can not afford to support the needs of millions of illegals for education and medical care, and we are already pretty crowded and have problems housing people as it is.
We should consider something like the old Bracero program, which allowed in temporary seasonal agricultural workers. This would enable them to make a decent income which they could send home to support their families, while avoiding our need to provide medical care, schooling and other support for families. Temporary residency away from their families is not the life that many would like, but it would be a lot better than what they are facing now.
Thank you, Mr. Donegan.
To think that many Americans will jump at the chance to work in the fields is to misunderstand the nature of that work. And why would they pick strawberries for $25 an hour when they can work just about anywhere else (at least in California) for only slightly less? In ‘N Out Burger pays $19 to start. And anyone who cleans toilets also probably has a number of other duties to go with it, none of which are as hard as picking strawberries. Trash truck drivers already make at least $25 an hour and, while that work might be somewhat dirty, it is certainly not as physically demanding as field work. As for coal miners, I think maybe Fly has recently watched How Green Was My Valley or Harlan County USA. There are currently fewer than 50,000 people employed by coal mines in the U.S. and most of those workers run machines. As for medical waste, I have no idea, but I doubt it involves much actual labor.
As for Steinbeck, he is my favorite writer, but he wrote about a long gone period in our history. When midwestern farmers, whose farms were destroyed by a combination of economic and environmental disasters (not to mention technological gains in the agricultural industry), came to California they did indeed work extremely hard in the fields. But they were eventually replaced by….migrants. Today, the heirs of those poor Okies are, in many cases, the owners of farms in the valley or have pursued other objectives.
While the Bracero program was a temporary solution, it had its positives and negatives. My idea is to spend the $170 billion to sort these folks out. Rather than rounding them up in chaotic raids, let’s give them a chance to state their case in a court of law. Obviously the criminals will not show up, and so they should be deported for failure to appear. As for the rest, let them have their day in court. For many of them who have established roots in the U.S., like the gardner that was pushed to the ground by ICE who had fathered three Marine Corps sons, we should keep them and make their path to citizenship clear and inexpensive. For some who don’t really have roots, maybe a Bracero type program could work.
This current haphazard method of causing terror and cruelty for cruelty’s sake is not going to solve anything. I also believe that most of the billions set aside for immigration from the BBB will be filtered to the corporate interests and private contractors who will take it to build ramshackle detention centers where detainees will be treated as sub-human (as is currently happening at Alligator Alcatraz, according to reporting). All the while, the stock holders who have invested in these prisons will laugh all the way to the bank with taxpayer money. In fact, following Trump’s election, shares of major private prison companies like GEO Group and CoreCivic experienced substantial gains.
John D:
The reason one doesn’t see “white faces” in the fields of the Central Valley is because the wages suck. The wages suck because farmers can always find an illegal willing to work. When the illegals are returned from whence they came, farmers will have to raise wages to attract legal workers. It’ll be interesting to see where this market of sellers of labor and buyers of labor meet in terms of wages. That’s the magic of penny capitalism. Sure, the price of a head of lettuce may go up, but who cares? I used to live in the Central Valley, the heat, air pollution, and Valley Fever are no joke.
The skilled labor in the building trades would probably be 40% higher if not for illegals taking over the building trades. My late father was a carpenter and whose job sites Id go to with him on Saturdays. Let’s just say the demographics at those job sites were a lot different back then as were the men involved in the trades. This was in the early 80s in So Cal. I know precisely how well working men got paid. Now, it’s trash, as is the purchasing power of the dollar. Thank you open border and bank bailout Boomers.
Michael Smith:
Your fantasy and those of your party is a return to power where what, you roll back everything the Republican party has done? Not in a million years. The best you can hope for is a divided Congress after the midterms. You’re party will never restore social security, will never institute a national healthcare system, will never slash defense spending, certainly won’t defund ICE or tear down the border wall. And why should they? Removing 40 million illegal aliens is actually popularly supported. Everything people like you do is poking a lion in cage. The minute the cage is opened, you go running to the zoo keeper. You’re real tough when out of power, but just continue the looting when in power. Nice try.
Steinbeck shows the power of FDRs New Deal when Tom Jode’s family stops by a government run, clean work camp. It’s basically public housing. That’s what we need, now. If your party returned to those policies, your party might actually win again. You’ve turned your backs on FDR and now Trump is the penalty you pay. Deal with it. You brought all of this on yourselves, lol. Worse, your party is courting the flag burners in LA as the future of your party. Youre basically scraping the bottom of the barrel. How desperate. Shame on you, anything for a vote, right? Your party is a bunch of prostitutes turning tricks in a back alley for votes.
Lastly, your party literally started bombing Russia last fall. Let that sink in. A vote for your party is a vote for omnicide
First off Fly, I’m simply a poor retired farmer, so I believe I’m somewhat knowledgable on this topic. I have nothing to be ashamed of in the slightest. The Democratic Party has not lived up to my expectations in many ways but I will continue to vote for them because they represent the best option. To blow up the country by voting for a man like Trump just seems suicidal and we are now a lot closer to the economic ruin you constantly rant about than we would be otherwise. But I’ll bow out and leave you to your Marxist fever dream and your endless comments. Hope your bread-maker is working well.
Michael Smith:
I get it now, you’re a retired farmer. That makes sense. Advocating for mass, illegal immigration has nothing to do with what those on the left would mistakingly call “human rights,” but rather, is based on your economic interest. You depend on exploiting illegals, that’s how you made your nut. I’d be curious to know how many of my tax dollars you gladly took in the form of farm subsidies too? And you call ME a Marxist, lol. I’d bet that even in retirement you are, or were until the feds finally cracked down on illegal immigration, still making money leasing your salt ridden land in the Central Valley. If you indeed still lease your land to share croppers, you are actually worried that your retirement plan that included the same cheap, illegal labor you used when you personally farmed, is going away. Like the cotton plantation owners in the deep South who depended on chattel slavery prior to the civil war, so do you. If you are leasing your land and relying on basically slave labor given by illegals, it brings me great joy to know it has blown up in your face. You can start paying fair wages and your taxes too. You aren’t a farmer, you own a slave plantation. Have a nice day massah’….
I can do this all day long, I’m a history major.
WTF, I drove a tractor for 40 years. Was an expert in soil science. Worked fields from Guadalupe to Oceano. Worked with plenty of migrants. Salt of the earth. None of them were ever exploited. They worked a full day for a full wage. Which is not something I can say about you, who appears to spend his entire day monitoring the comment section on New Times, and probably a regular on a bunch of other social media as well. Guessing you’re a 300 pound dude sitting in his mother’s basement.
Sorry, New Times, delete if you wish, but this guy is out of control.
By the way, before you demonize the migrants you preach about, you might listen to this song. I’m not sure you’re capable of human feelings, but I think BABY BOOMER Jackson Browne says it best about our undocumented population. I stood with this man at the gates of Diablo Canyon in 1981 and was arrested along with another great man, Bill Deneen, who was a veteran that stormed the beaches of Normandy in 1944.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9A3hiWw9R6…
“You depend on exploiting illegals, that’s how you made your nut.”
Wait a second, I thought your argument was that they were exploiting America by taking jobs and sending housing costs higher. Now, they’re the ones being exploited. Make up your mind.
Michael:
That’s great, you knew some migrants, me too. you still evaded the question, you stated you still own land in the Central Valley and are retired. It’s not often a farmer sells their land. So my question is, are you leasing it out? Is it being farmed? Are the workers illegal? When you presumably farmed your land before you retired, did you hire illegals? If so, like many other “farmers,” they evade taxes by hiring illegals as they receive farm subsidies. So basically, they are collecting a welfare check and working under the table. When all the illegals are sent home, farmers will have to actually run their farms like real businesses, pay certain wages, and pay their fair share of taxes. My heart breaks for them. It’s so unfair, lol.
I’ve never said anything inflammatory, cussed, or used racial epithets on this forum. This is an adult conversation. I suspect I touched a nerve. Again, is the land you claim to own in the Central Valley being farmed by share croppers?
I actually work two jobs and on my breaks I like to post on this forum. I’m not on any other social media, I’m not 300lbs, I’m married, my wife has a green card I paid for, and rode my track bike 12 miles today after doing 6 sets of squats of moderate to low weight mid day during my lunch break. I’m also old. Is that good enough for you?
I wouldn’t worry too much, Michael. This is a very obscure forum no one reads except maybe 5 or 6 of us burnouts.
Michael:
Just so you know, referring to people as “300lbs” is what is called “fat shaming,” and you just did it. Congratulations, old timer. A person’s weight is not a reflection of their intellectual acuity or personality but referring to someone’s weight in the way you did would cause a lot of shame for people who struggle with their weight. If anyone needs to be thrown off this this forum, it’s you, not me.
I never claimed to own anything other than my modest house in Guadalupe. Worked various farms over the years, all on the CC, wherever the money was best. My degree in soil science from Cal Poly in 1965 did me well. Worked with a thousand migrants, most of them the hardest working individuals I ever knew, way smarter than any of the idiots I went to school with. Never knew any history majors though. Not sure there were any then. Poly basically a vocational school in those days.
I am old and burned out. Need a walker these days. But your comments irk me. Just can’t understand how you can be a fan of FDR and support Trump. He is tearing down everything the New Deal stood for. I know the Dems have not produced a strong counter to the neo-liberal crap of Reagan, but vote for Trump? Really?
Anyway, I have lunch at La Simpatia in Guad every Friday. Join me and we can discuss how much you hate me.
Michael:
I’d love to join you, Guadalupe has great food. Unfortunately, I have a shift I have to work at my second job. The migrant community is hard working, no argument here. The world is full of hard working people. That doesn’t give anyone the right to skip across our national border, work illegally, allow farmers to dodge taxes, and then, when our federal government attempts to clamp down on it, start burning our flags and attacking our federal workers. These are not the kind of people needs or wants.
I was raised around Democrats and only recently changed my party affiliation as a protest. My decision to do so had nothing to do with Trump or his personality. Third parties are unviable and the Democratic party has failed Americans. I’ve waited my whole life for things to change, and it has. It’s gotten worse, both parties are at fault for it. I never left the Democratic party, it left me. I literally have an antique, ceramic decorative gold rimmed plate at my work desk with a picture of FDR on it. I’m waiting for FDRs party to return to FDRs vision. Further, how can you support a party that was literally, through its president and Command in Chief, bombing Russia? We almost all died last Fall. I found myself trying to find the nearest shelter to hide myself and my family when Russia inevitably respond. We are lucky we are still here. Zylenski is the biggest scumbag I’ve ever seen as is his regime.
Here a black and white movie from ’45 clearly showing Americans picking cotton. Manual labor is as American as apple pie:
https://youtu.be/BdWNlyup4D8?si=C0xZVh2mUU…
Perhaps attending a trade school would’ve worked out better than being a history major.
Peter:
If I never studied history, I’d never be able to contextualize our world. I’d be what’s called a “low information voter.” All these corrupt politicians are nothing new, they’ve been here before and will be here when we are gone. Further, my late father was a carpenter, I’ll pass on wood splinters in my hands and industrial accidents. This is why I’m concerned about the effect that mass, illegal immigration has on the building trades. I’m guessing it has reduced the wages of men in the building trades by 40 percent. There are no sacred industries, from farming to general contracting. If they are using illegal labor, they’re dodging taxes and ruining it all for the rest of us. Every single employer doing so needs to be prosecuted. It’s time for working men and women to earn fair wages and for employers to pay the tax they owe. I don’t even know why this is such a radical or contentious concept.