NEW: Special Report: The federal H-2A program has grown rapidly as the rural workforce has aged and a crackdown against undocumented workers has intensified under President Trump. The program has subjected some workers to horrific abuse.
was certified to hire 23 H-2A workers last year. Industry lobbyists are pushing Congress and the Trump administration to extend the program to new kinds of agricultural workers and to make it cheaper and easier to use.
No one was likely to check up on Sanchez: Under federal law, housing needs to pass inspection only when an employer applies to bring H-2A workers to the U.S. After workers arrive — sometimes months later — no follow-ups are required. Last year, the Trump administration acknowledged some of the "unsafe and unsanitary" conditions facing H-2A workers. In July 2019, the administration
by allowing employers to hire guest workers more quickly and keep them in the U.S. longer. “The Trump administration is working to keep our farmers and growers competitive while ensuring that American workers have access to more opportunities and higher wages,” the White House said in a statement, adding that problems with H-2A workers’ health, safety, and employment “can be identified and resolved.
"Who are the most powerless people in this process, in the weakest negotiating and bargaining position?" Hancock said. "The workers."Guest workers on H-2A visas harvesting collard greens in eastern North Carolina. Juana Cruz first spotted Sanchez's crew walking along a back road off U.S. 84 in early March 2018.
Cruz entered a house that looked like it was rotting from the inside out, she said. A worker had slipped in the filthy shower and hurt his arm; he had to use paper to stanch the bleeding because there was no first-aid kit, he later testified, according to court documents. A spider bit another man while he was sleeping in the sheds outside. His entire face swelled up when the wound got infected, and he was rushed to the hospital, he and the other men said.
The next day, she dropped off a pot of rice and beans she had cooked for them. Hours later, she walked into her church, interrupting evening Bible study to tell the pastor what she had witnessed.The men scattered. Some hid inside the house, Luna recalled, fearing that immigration agents had come to deport them, as Sanchez kept threatening would happen, even though they'd done nothing wrong.
Luna and two other workers were ultimately convinced. Through the church, they got a ride to Savannah soon afterward and walked into the federal Labor Department's regional office to file a complaint. Sanchez stormed off. Days later, he promised to move the workers to better housing and started paying some of the men for their work, the men later attested. But for Reyes, Sanchez's concessions weren't enough.
In July 2019, a U.S. District Court issued a default judgment against Sanchez, who failed to appear in court, concluding that he had subjected the H-2A workers to forced labor, human trafficking and "deplorable and dangerous living conditions for weeks," the judge wrote in her decision. Under federal law, Sanchez needed a $10,000 bond to get his application for H-2A workers approved — a requirement for all farm labor contractors because of their checkered history of being "," according to the federal government. But only the Labor Department can get access to that money, which still hasn't been made available to the workers, their attorney said. Even if it were, the funds would be only a fraction of what they are owed under the court ruling.
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