US making it cheaper for farmers to hire foreign farmworkers to address labor shortage: Report

ISTANBUL

The Trump administration is making it cheaper for farmers to hire immigrant farmworkers on temporary visas in an effort to address a labor shortage aggravated by immigration raids and a crackdown on the border, the New York Times reported Sunday.

The report cited the US Labor Department as saying that the near-total halt in undocumented immigration combined with insufficient legal labor was threatening domestic food production and driving up consumer prices.

In response, the department adjusted how wages paid to temporary foreign farmworkers under the H-2A visa program are calculated, effectively cutting hourly pay by between $1 and $7 depending on the state.

The Economic Policy Institute estimated that the changes would reduce annual wages for guest farmworkers by $2 billion and for US-based farmworkers by $3 billion.

US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins defended the move as giving farmers the tools they need.

The move also drew sharp criticism. The United Farm Workers union argued that it would displace longtime domestic farmworkers and expose migrant laborers to greater abuse.

Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies said the change encouraged foreign migration and discouraged automation, both contrary to what the administration had publicly championed as goals.

However, data confirms local disinterest. According to the newspaper, out of the 415,000 job postings announced in 2025, only 182 received applications from domestic candidates.

“I don’t think it’s fair that our pay will be lowered so much,” said a longtime farmworker in Idaho facing a wage drop from $17 to $11 an hour.