Two Counties, Two Takes on Immigration
April 20, 2006 — -- In Mexico, Felipe Hernandez could make about $50 a week. In the United States? $300.
The income gap between Mexico and the United States is the widest for two countries sharing a border anywhere in the world, so it is an easy decision for thousands of Mexican laborers to rise hours before dawn and ride across the border for long days of intense, back-breaking work on massive farms and ranches.
On Wednesday, U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement conducted raids in nine states in what it says is the beginning of a nationwide effort to better enforce immigration laws.
But two counties along Arizona's border with Mexico illustrate the complexity of the issue. In Yuma County, in the southwestern corner of the state, immigrants are in high demand. In Cochise County, along the border with New Mexico, there are few jobs to spare.
Yuma County produces about 90 percent of the lettuce, broccoli and cauliflower shipped between Thanksgiving and Easter -- a business worth more than a $1 billion a year. And the big growers depend upon immigrant labor, legal or otherwise.
"I have worked since I was 7 years old in the field, and not once have I ever seen an Anglo-American pick alongside me," said Fernando Esqueda, who once picked lettuce at his mother's side and now runs a non-profit that helps immigrants.
In Yuma, employers reach out to legal workers. Rick Rademacher of the Yuma County Fresh Vegetable Association points to the three or four pages of classified ads in the newspaper as proof. But the responses to them cannot satisfy the demand.
"We can't find enough people to do the job," Rademacher said. "We're slowly mechanizing, but that's ongoing. We still can't eliminate people. We still need the people."
The growers insist they do their best to hire legal immigrants. But that job is farmed out to the labor contractors, and the truth is both sides operate in the gray area between what the law says and how it is enforced because a billion-dollar business depends on it.
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