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President Donald Trump said Tuesday he is exploring deportation exemptions for illegal migrants working on farms or in the hospitality industry who could be swept up in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids.
Trump said workers who have spent years in the U.S. labor force, particularly in the agriculture and hospitality industries, may be eligible for a new type of work permit that would allow them to remain in the country legally, pay taxes and continue working but without receiving citizenship.
The proposed plan, which has not yet been formally announced, would create a system by which farmers and other employers take legal responsibility for longtime undocumented workers.
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“We’re going to take care of our farmers and hotel workers, but we’re working on it right now. And Ron [DeSantis is] going to be involved,” Trump said during a tour of a new immigration detention camp in Florida’s Everglades that is surrounded by alligators, “Alligator Alcatraz.”
“We have a lot of cases where ICE would go into the farm, and these are guys that are working there for 10 to 15 years, no problem.
“The farmers know them. It’s called ‘farmer responsibility’ or ‘owner responsibility,’ but they’re going to be largely responsible for these people, and they know these people. They’ve worked on the farms for 15 years. … We have a great feeling for the farmer and for others in the same position.
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“They can be here legally. They can pay taxes and everything. They’re not getting citizenship, but they get other things. And the farmers need them to do the work,” Trump said. “Without those people, you’re not going to be able to run your farm.”
The future status of illegal migrants working in these sectors has been raised over the last number of weeks with Trump saying that farmers and hospital operators have raised concerns they may lose valuable members of their workforce should those illegal migrants be caught up in his mass deportation operations.
Trump’s plan may not sit well with his hardline immigration supporters as the president seeks to find middle ground between them and protecting businesses reliant on long-term immigrant labor.
“I won the farmers by 92%, and I’m not going to be abandoning my farmers,” Trump said at a roundtable discussion after the tour. “We were strong with the voters, but we’re also strong for the farmers and for others in the hotel industry.
“They’re not going to have citizenship, but they’ll be working. They’ll be paying taxes,” Trump reiterated. “We need to get our farmers the people they need, otherwise the farmers aren’t going to be able to work their land.”
Trump said that during a previous mass deportation effort, California farmers were left without enough workers to harvest their crops.
“You know, we tried this once before, many, many years ago, when there was a very strong guy, and he got everybody out. And every farmer — almost all the farmers in the country — went bankrupt, and they had nobody to work. And we don’t want to have that situation,” Trump said without citing who he was referring to.
He was likely referring to President Dwight Eisenhower’s 1954 mass deportation campaign that saw the deportation of more than 1 million migrants.
The president made similar comments about hotels and farms potentially running into issues as a result of federal immigration enforcement June 12.
“Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace,” Trump posted to Truth Social.
“In many cases the Criminals allowed into our Country by the VERY Stupid Biden Open Borders Policy are applying for those jobs. This is not good. We must protect our Farmers, but get the CRIMINALS OUT OF THE USA. Changes are coming!”
On June 19, border czar Tom Homan signaled that those operations would continue, but they are not a major focus.
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