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Perdue: We need legal farm labor

 

The U.S. Ag Secretary says the current immigration debate needs to address concerns of farmers and farm workers.

While immigration policy was top of the list for causing the government shut down, Secretary Sonny Perdue told reporters this week, “We’re hopeful that a broader immigration bill does address legal farm labor.  I hope that will be a part of it because if it doesn’t, our farm communities will be left out again and I don’t know when the next time we will address those kind of issues.”

Perdue says he’s told Homeland Security farm workers are not the ones causing issues and are desperately needed.  “Immigrant labor on our farms—they’re not the criminals out here, they’re not the ones that are violating the law—they’re hard working people that our farmers need.”

He says the current H-2A guest worker program doesn’t work well and is too cumbersome for farmers.