Deportations would hit dairy farms hard
If not for his longtime Mexican employees, dairy farmer Hans Breitenmoser Jr. says he would be forced out of business.
His herd of around 400 cows must be milked three times a day, 365 days a year. His 10 or so foreign-born employees have proven reliable even as the pipeline for other workers dried up long ago.
Many other businesses probably feel the same way. More than 30 million immigrants were in the U.S. workforce as of 2022, accounting for 18% of all U.S. workers. Lawful immigrants made up the majority of the immigrant workforce at 22.2 million people, according to the Pew Research Center. That means President-elect Donald Trump’s pledge to deport unauthorized immigrants could trigger a labor crisis at a time when businesses are struggling to find help.
'It doesn’t matter if these people are from Mexico or Mars. It doesn’t matter because we need X number of people to run the economy,' Breitenmoser said. 'If they’re not here, it doesn’t work.'
The threat of large-scale deportations was a cornerstone of Trump’s election campaign as part of his promise to secure the U.S. southern border. Much is still unknown about how the plan would be implemented, and many doubt whether it’s realistic. But observers say workplace raids are certainly a possibility.
'I would be surprised if employers didn’t already have a playbook for what to do,' said Brian Jacobsen, chief economist for Annex Wealth Management.
By many accounts, immigrants provide most of the labor on large and midsize dairy operations. Dairies that employ immigrants are responsible for 79% of the U.S. milk supply, according to the National Milk Producers Federation. The loss of foreign-born workers would upend the industry and nearly double retail milk prices, the federation said.
Dairy farming would collapse in a 'big, nasty, ugly way,' Breitenmoser said.
Some farmers say they haven’t encountered a U.S.-born applicant in years, and it’s crucial they have immigrant employees to fill those jobs.
'They’re good, decent people who are getting work done that otherwise wouldn’t get done,' Breitenmoser said.
Many immigrants at dairy farms are working in the U.S. without authorization because, unlike seasonal farmworkers, there is no employment visa available to them. For decades, lawmakers have been urged to create a visa suitable for year-round employment on dairy farms, but the efforts have been thwarted by the politics surrounding immigration.
Still, it’s a worthy goal, according to the industry.
'Dairy farmers cannot lose their current workers without massive disruption to their farms and to rural economies. Employees who have been working on dairy farms should be able to continue working and earn permanent legal status, as should their immediate families,' said the National Milk Producers Federation.
'The H-2A guest worker visa program, used by many in agriculture to attract seasonal foreign labor, doesn’t fit dairy’s year-round needs but could be improved to make the program workable,' it added.
The National Farmers Union, a trade group, said the incoming Trump administration should encourage Congress to pass comprehensive immigration reform such as the Farm Workforce Modernization Act, a bipartisan bill introduced in the 116th, 117th, and 118th Congresses.
The issue goes far beyond dairy farms. Many say U.S. manufacturing, which has struggled with talent shortages, is long overdue for immigration reform.
'The current system does not allow us to reach our full potential for economic growth and leadership,' said the National Association of Manufacturers, a business group with more than 14,000 member companies. 'The system is difficult for both employers and applicants to navigate.'
Some of the group’s proposed solutions include reforming guest worker programs, creating a new visa category to address temporary economic needs, and establishing a fully electronic and mandatory employment verification system to ensure that undocumented workers aren’t displacing U.S. workers and provide employers confidence in hiring.
'The fact is, without immigration we are a demographically declining country,' said Dale Kooyenga, president of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce.
For everyone’s sake, Kooyenga says, problems at the southern border must be resolved. However, 'if we’re going to enforce that border as it should be enforced, then we need to drastically increase legal immigration because our economy relies upon immigrants,' he said.
The majority of U.S. registered voters said immigrants – both undocumented and legal – mostly fill jobs that citizens don’t want, according to a Pew Research Center survey from August.
Some also contend that Trump is bluffing about his threats of mass deportations. As a candidate in 2016, he promised to deport every immigrant living in the U.S. illegally, then estimated to be 11 million people. He failed to do so. In fact, though deportations were high during the first Trump administration, they were lower than under President Barack Obama.
Trump also doubled the number of H-2A visas used in hospitality and other industries, said Rebecca Shi, executive director of the American Business Immigration Coalition. 'I think he understands intrinsically, because of his businesses, why immigrants are important,' Shi said.
Still, Wisconsin’s immigrant community is worried. Both Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection may make deportation arrests even if local law enforcement doesn’t cooperate. In about seven Wisconsin counties, ICE agreements give local law enforcement the authority to detain people or even act as immigration officers.
Trump’s advisers have indicated they could try to expand the use of a process called 'expedited removal,' which would seek to quickly deport people en masse by circumventing the court system. Individuals who have been in the U.S. for decades could be swept up in raids.
