Lack of immigration law is intolerable.
By Merilee Dannemann
Lack of immigration law is intolerable.
A dairy farm in southeastern New Mexico was more or less put out of business a few weeks ago when 11 workers were arrested for alleged immigration violations and the farmer had to fire an additional 24 workers.
The workers allegedly provided false documentation. What would you expect them to do? Presumably they did what they had to do to qualify for a job.
The farmer reportedly is now just taking care of his cows. Without those employees he can’t do what’s needed to sell milk. Nobody benefits from this.
Dairy is a major industry in southeastern New Mexico. According to a legislative report, the dairy industry contributes more than $4 billion a year to the state’s economy. Our state is home to the largest cheese plant in the US: Southwest Cheese in Clovis. Roughly 1750 jobs are tied to this industry. The report didn’t say how many of those jobs are held by undocumented workers.
These workers are needed. Why should their presence be illegal?
Because Congress won’t pass an updated immigration law.
President Trump caused this crisis by demanding raids to increase deportation. Since the raid on this farm, Trump has said ICE should leave both farms and the hospitality industry alone, but then he said something else that contradicted that order. This is blather, not policy. None of it matters to the farm that already lost its workforce or the workers who may be losing everything.
Trump also suggested taxing money sent by workers to their families in another country. As if they weren’t underpaid enough.
America should not be running its immigration policy, or any other policy, on the whims of the president. We need updated laws, passed by a functioning Congress that does what the Constitution says its job is.
Another side of the immigration issue was recently covered in a powerful investigative article by Molly Montgomery in Searchlight New Mexico, which so far has not drawn nearly enough attention from New Mexico policy makers.Titled “The boots on Buck Jackson Road,” the article describes working conditions for oilfield workers in the Permian basin – “harrowing conditions that lead to death, injury, disease and terrible tolls on mental health and family life.”
The article describes both physical dangers and chemical exposures that affect oilfield workers, and the lack of safety and healthcare services. The writer does not explore the legal status of these workers, maybe because that is the only way they would talk to her. I’m wondering if the dubious immigration status of some of these workers is part of the reason why they put up with the abusive conditions of the work.
America’s history is full of stories of immigrant laborers who did the dangerous work of building our nation, from the Chinese who built the railroads to the Irish who built the Brooklyn Bridge. Immigrants pick our crops, change the sheets in hotels and care for our elderly in nursing homes. They and their employers deserve clear, consistent laws that clarify their status.
Congress has been avoiding passing an update to the immigration law for a few decades now. Republicans in Congress have made it clear they want the controversy as a campaign issue rather than a solution to the problem.
Most recently, in January 2024 the Republicans in Congress prevented the passage of a bipartisan border security bill, because then-candidate Donald Trump told them not to pass it.
Enough. This is intolerable. Congress should debate the issues as if every individual member had individual responsibility, decide who can be here legally and who can’t, and pass either a new comprehensive immigration law or a series of smaller laws that collectively cover the whole subject. That is what we elected them for.
Merilee Dannemann’s columns are posted at www.triplespacedagain.com. Comments are invited through the web site.
© 2025 by Merilee Dannemann
The views and opinions expressed in this essay are the author’s own and not necessarily shared by other contributors and supporters of the New Mexico Jewish Journal.
Read also:
- Who's going to milk your cows? By Sherry Robinson
- DAIRY PRODUCER:
Tanya Eadie
- DAIRY REPORTER, which suggests that milk prices could go up 90% if ICE arrests all the immigrants working in the dairy industry, who are more than 50% of the workers:
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