Free Republic

WASHINGTON – Taking his blowhard comedy act to Congress, Stephen Colbert told lawmakers that a day picking beans alongside illegal immigrants convinced him that farm work is "really, really hard." "It turns out — and I did not know this — most soil is at ground level," Colbert testified Friday. Also, "It was hotter than I like to be." Still, Colbert expressed befuddlement that more Americans aren't clamoring to "begin an exciting career" in the fields and instead are leaving the low-paid work to illegal immigrants. Staying in character as a Comedy Central news commentator, Colbert offered a House hearing...

An insightful article in the sophisticated leftwing site, Counterpunch, further strips Ms. Shirley Sherrod of the martyr's rags she has been wearing since first exposed and then un-exposed as a racist Ag official two weeks back. The author, Ron Wilkins, had worked under an assumed name at Sherrod's New Communities Incorporated (NCI) in the 1970s. A former organizer with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Wilkins had been tasked with discovering the reasons for "NCI's continued poor performance." What he discovered was that at NCI "the young and old worked long hours with few breaks, the pay averaged sixty-seven cents an...

(07-16) 17:49 PDT ARVIN, Calif. (AP) -- California workforce safety officials say the death of a Kern County farmworker is one of five possible heat-related deaths they're investigating across the state. Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2010/07/16/state/n174931D76.DTL#ixzz0tuPp6ZG7

Environmental activist Lloyd Carter resigned from the California Water Impact Network late Monday afternoon -- after more than 100 people showed up outside Fresno City Hall to rally against his comments last week that disparaged farm workers.

The eight houses and nine mobile homes are clustered in a pair of dusty lots on a farm road east of Oxnard, bordered by farms, agricultural warehouses and Pacific Coast Highway. Most of the houses have been expanded in some slapdash way, with plywood lean-tos a common feature. The houses and trailers have broken windows, walls patched with more plywood, and extension cords stretching from the windows. Inside the homes, county inspectors have found mold infestations, leaking pipes, sinks that don't drain and walls that leave daylight streaming in. "It's up there with the worst places I've seen," said Ron...

Honduran president Jose Manuel Zelaya Rosales and representatives from El Salvador and Guatemala met with California farmers Saturday to hash out a plan that will train laborers from those countries to work in the Western U.S. The plan is set to start with about 300 workers from Mexico and Central America. It will operate under existing U.S. guest worker laws and take at least a year to implement, said Manuel Cunha Jr., president of the Nisei Farmers League, a group that represents hundreds of agriculture businesses in California, Washington, Oregon and Arizona. Growers plan to work with Latin American countries...

An ambitious agricultural guest-worker plan died with a whimper and not a bang this week, as senators quietly dropped the proposal from an Iraq war spending bill. With little ceremony and no debate, a quick parliamentary maneuver late Tuesday night killed California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein's guest-worker plan. The plan would have given temporary legal status to 1.35 million illegal immigrant farm workers, as well as their spouses and children. "We knew it was an uphill battle, but we thought it was one worth fighting," Scott Gerber, Feinstein's press secretary, said Wednesday. Still, the unexpected revival and equally abrupt demise...

SALINAS, California - Sen. Hillary Clinton won the endorsement of the United Farm Workers on Tuesday in Salinas, California, where she was greeted by supporters chanting “Viva Hillary, Viva Hillary.” The farm workers union said it “believes Hillary Clinton to be the strongest, most experienced candidate for President of the United States. She will be able to tackle our nation’s toughest problems - health care, improving the economy for working people and repairing our country’s standing in the world.” Founded in 1962 by Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, the UFW now represents some 27,000 workers. “The farmworkers are problem solvers...

Tell Burger King to Stop Being a Scrooge Farm workers who toil to pick tomatoes for Burger King's sandwiches earn 40 to 50 cents for every 32-pound bucket of tomatoes they pick, a rate that has not risen significantly in nearly 30 years. Workers would have to pick 2.5 tons of tomatoes just to earn minimum wage for a typical 10-hour day.But instead of joining other fast-food chains in paying an extra penny per pound for its tomatoes, this Christmas Burger King is working to undermine those chains' existing agreements with the Coalition for Immokalee Workers. As a result, tomato...

At least half, and possibly as many as 70 percent, of the 1.6 million farmworkers in America are undocumented immigrants, and their employers are painfully aware that there are not enough U.S.-born citizens and legal immigrants to do all the labor-intensive work they require. Agribusiness, farmworkers unions and enlightened lawmakers from both parties have pleaded for solutions, only to be foiled by congressional Republicans and swing-state Democrats who dare not support legislation that would provide undocumented farmworkers with a path to legalization -- the dread "amnesty" of 30-second attack ads. By doing nothing to ensure a steady, reliable and sufficient...

MIAMI (AP) Hundreds of farmworkers, union members and activists marched through city streets to Burger King headquarters Friday to protest low wages for tomato pickers and alleged exploitation of field workers. About 300 to 400 protesters gathered under the skyscrapers of Miami's downtown, many wearing yellow T-shirts reading ``Exploitation King'' and ``Burger King Exploits Farmworkers,'' others holding signs saying ``Dignity'' or ``Justice for Tomato Pickers.'' The marchers, some strumming guitars and banging large tin cans with sticks, easily swelled to double that number during their nine-mile trek to Burger King's offices, where a rally was held. The protesters are pressuring...

In politics, the surest path to irrelevance and powerlessness is to be taken for granted by one party and written off by another. That's the road Latinos are on, thanks to major blunders by the Republicans campaigning for president. In June, all but California's Duncan Hunter blew off an invitation to address the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. In September, a debate on Spanish-language television had to be postponed after all but Arizona Sen. John McCain refused to commit. After taking criticism for the snub, Rudy Giuliani, Fred Thompson and Mitt Romney have committed to taking part...

  The debate over immigration amnesty could soon return to the Senate floor. According to press reports, Senator Diane Feinstein (D–CA) plans to attach the proposed Agricultural Job Opportunities, Benefits, and Security Act of 2007 (AgJOBS) to the Farm Bill Extension Act of 2007. The AgJOBS bill is all too similar to the comprehensive immigration reform bill that was rejected in Congress last spring, which would have granted amnesty to millions of people who are unlawfully present in the United States. Amnesty would worsen the immigration problem in America, encouraging more illegal border crossings and undermining the credibility of American...

Labor provisions could be tucked into ag legislation. WASHINGTON -- Farmers, immigrants and their Capitol Hill allies are hoping to graft an agricultural guest-worker plan onto the multibillion-dollar farm bill.Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., hasn't yet decided whether to push the controversial guest-worker measure when the Senate considers the farm bill next week. Behind the scenes, though, proponents are counting votes and lobbying furiously."Now we're getting down to the nitty-gritty, where real hard decisions have to be made," said Dan Haley, a lobbyist for the California Strawberry Commission and other farm groups. "We can't wait around."Tactically, this is a very tough...

Washington, D.C. — Legislation that would grant legal immigration status to thousands of migrant farmworkers will likely be added to the Senate’s farm bill, said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Farmers in and around the Bay Area are starting to feel the pinch from tighter border security and visa requirements, NBC11's Daniel Garza reported Monday. Some farmers told Garza they expect some of their fields to remain unpicked. Some said they believe their fields will end up filled with rotting produce. The Bush administration has learned of the possible loss of millions of dollars for thousands of farmers throughout the country, and is attempting to loosen visa requirements for workers. However, farmers told Garza the attempt is "too little too late."

WASHINGTON -- With a nationwide farmworker shortage threatening to leave unharvested fruits and vegetables rotting in fields, the Bush administration has begun quietly rewriting federal regulations to eliminate barriers that restrict how foreign laborers can be brought into the country legally. The urgent effort, under way at the U.S. departments of Homeland Security, State and Labor, is meant to help farm owners caught in a vice between an impossibly complex process to hire legal guest-workers and stepped-up enforcement that has reduced the number of undocumented planters and pickers crossing the border. "It is important for the farm sector to have...

HAMPTONBURGH, N.Y., Aug. 16 — With a look of supreme satisfaction, Jeff Crist squinted at the Ginger Golds and Jonamacs ripening under an incandescent sun at his apple orchard here: the trees were so laden that they almost seemed to strain under the effort. “It’s a vintage crop — a solid quality crop, which means good sugars in the apples,” he said. “They should eat very nicely, almost like a good wine.” This is the third year in a row of near-perfect weather, and Mr. Crist, a fourth-generation apple grower, like many other growers in the Hudson Valley, is finally...

Sen. Edward Kennedy needs Marna Vasquez, and vice versa. Vasquez is a packinghouse worker from Porterville. Kennedy is a rich and famous Democratic senator from Massachusetts. Nonetheless, the 37-year-old former illegal immigrant and the 75-year-old lawmaker briefly shared a Capitol Hill stage this week to push for sweeping immigration revisions. Vasquez needs Kennedy's bill to help her friends and neighbors. He needs her voice to persuade congressional fence-sitters. "I have a lot of faith that we're going to win," Vasquez said. "That's how we feel." But there are strong feelings on all sides of the immigration debate, which resumes Tuesday...

As heated as the debate over the immigration overhaul is on Capitol Hill, the divisions may run even deeper among immigrants themselves. The measure is pitting computer-science Ph.D.s against strawberry pickers, legal immigrants against illegal ones, and those who want it all against those who are grateful for whatever the bill offers. "Our only hope is immigration reform," said Connie Yoon, a Korean immigrant living illegally with her parents and sister in Chicago. "The chance of legalization - it means everything to us." The legislation before the Senate could lead to the most sweeping changes in U.S. immigration policy in...