USA: Migrant farmworkers from undocumented families protest deportations & abusive working conditions in California
“Farmworker Youth Take to the Streets as Deportations and Displacement Threaten Their Parents”
This March 30, the day before Cesar Chavez’s birthday, a high school student named Cesar Vasquez walked up the rise. He was surrounded by other young protesters, all from Santa Maria farmworker families, 80 percent of whom are undocumented…
…The system has pushed us onto our knees into the rows of dirt where the berries lie. We are tired of being called essential workers but not even treated as essential humans . . . We are going to do something about it . . . We can no longer be suffocated. It is our time to breathe, our time to rise, our time to fight!”…
Concepcion Chavez, who went on strike briefly in 2024, described that impact. “The company always keeps them [the H-2 workers] separate from us. If we don’t work hard, the supervisors say we will be replaced, they will send in the H-2As.”…
That fear can make workers more reluctant to demand higher wages and better conditions…
…One case, State of California vs. Alco Harvest, claims that thousands of workers were not legally paid. Alco is the largest H-2A employer in the two-county area. Alco did not respond to requests for comment…