Farmers want Obama to back off immigration workplace enforcement

[babylonsister]

Farmers want Obama to back off immigration workplace enforcement
By Michael Doyle | McClatchy Washington Bureau


WASHINGTON — Farmers’ congressional allies are pressuring the Obama administration to ease up on some immigration work-site enforcement, underscoring a conflict at the heart of a broad-based immigration bill.

This week, spurred by complaints from farmers in California’s Central Valley, Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein publicly urged the Department of Homeland Security to “redirect” immigration enforcement efforts toward “serious violent crimes” instead of “legitimate agricultural employers and their workers.”

“The reality is that the majority of farmworkers in the U.S. are foreign-born and unauthorized, which is well-known,” Feinstein wrote Tuesday, adding that she’s “afraid that this aggressive worksite enforcement strategy will deprive the agricultural sector of most of its workforce.”

Worksite monitoring has definitely heated up.

more...

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/09/05/201303/farmers-want-obama-to-back-off.html#.UikiWD-6jeM