Immigration hypocrisy in Georgia

In 1998, the then INS raided Georgia’s $200 million a year Vidalia sweet onion fields at the start of the harvest season. Within the hour of the start of the raid, the region’s Congressional representatives were on the telephone demanding the INS (predecessor to ICE) stop the raids. The INS had barely netted 28 workers and 20 Georgia counties scheduled for raids. Many of the non-apprehended workers fled the site and word got out to other fields causing panic among field workers who fled leaving onion to rot on the fields. But the raids stopped and to date no others have taken place.
   Yet the people of Georgia support tough border enforcement and wide anti illegal immigration laws but not immigration reform, not even guest worker program as the late Georgia Congressman Charlie Norwood classified it as “treachery against U.S. sovereignty” that would produce “moral devastation,” as he was quoted by Bloomsburg News in July 2006.
   Onion farmers claim to post job openings with employment offices but say there are few local applicants and those who do, usually quit after a day or two due to the harshness of the work. So sweet onion growers continue the practice of hiring undocumented workers with full knowledge that they are being in most cases, presented with false documents whose authenticity they don’t bother to check for fear of “finding out” that which they already know. Ah yes, the sweet smell of hypocrisy.
   Adding to the hypocrisy is the Georgia congressional delegation’s continued demand “to secure the border” with full knowledge that workers will still find their way to their Vidalia $200 million sweet onion fields as evidenced that the onion are still being harvested. But still no raids, no “enforce the law.”
   The hypocritical insistence of “enforcing” the laws on the books includes making new and harsher laws. And of course, not all existing laws are called on to be enforced as evidenced by the non-raids to growing fields during the harvest season and the non enforcement that farmers comply with the law that has been in effect since 1964’s H-2 temporary agricultural work visas, amended in 1986 producing the H-2A temporary agricultural work visa.
   The H-2A visa is not applied for by the workers, rather by the farmers either directly or through their associations. Working with the Department of Labor to comply with the requirement that farmers provide documentation that they have attempted to obtain local workers and unable to find the workers, obtain a permit to “import” a specific number of “foreign guest workers” for a determined time. The agreement includes paying wages that would be paid to local workers, provide health benefits, and temporary housing for which they can charge a reasonable amount to the workers, and provide transportation from and to the foreign country to the work place, plus daily transportation to the fields.
   The workers would be contracted in their home country and need to undergo medical exams, provide proof of no criminal record, and sign a contract which among other clauses specifies the worker will return on the expiration of the visa or not be eligible for future consideration.
   It is far easier to not comply with existing laws because it is cheaper to hire undocumented workers and lets face it $200 million suppresses a lot of hypocrisy.
   And so now the new Georgia governor, Nathan Deal, who takes office with ethics clouds and investigations hovering over him, is expected to continue the Georgia hypocrisy. Deal is one of those who believe that harsh laws that keep a politician in the news and citizens angry is a great pass time including an attempted massacre of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment he supports that would deny birthright citizenship to children born to an illegal immigrant mothers, but not to a child born to a legal resident or U.S. citizen mother whose father is an illegal immigrant.
   But here is betting that Governor Deal won’t let the Vidalia sweet onions rot in the fields.

Immigration hypocrisy in Georgia

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