Farmers Face Whiplash as Trump Immigration Shifts Keep Ag in Limbo

When it comes to the intersection of illegal immigration and agriculture, uncertainty has abounded under the second Trump administration. 

From targeted crackdowns on migrants with criminal backgrounds, to surprise raids on the ag sector, to course reversals from the administration, seemingly constant shifts have made it hard to know what’s coming next or how to prepare.

Below is a timeline of the situation and coverage from Successful Farming.

Editor’s note: Timeline dates reflect the dates events took place and may not align with Successful Farming’s “published on” dates of related coverage. 

January

Jan. 20, 2025

If it wasn’t evident during his campaign, Trump made his stance on illegal immigration abundantly clear at his inauguration, where he said he was declaring a national emergency and would be sending troops to the border.

“All illegal entry will immediately be halted, and we will begin the process of returning millions and millions of criminal aliens back to the places from which they came,” he said.

Jan. 23, 2025

At her confirmation hearing, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins said she supported Trump’s immigration agenda, noting that initial deportations would target migrants with criminal records. 

She didn’t directly address whether the administration would give a warning to farmers and ranchers that utilize immigrant labor on their operations. She did commit to working with ag groups on H-2A reform.

Jan. 27, 2025

A week after Trump took office, International Dairy Foods Association CEO Michael Dykes shared in a speech at the association’s Dairy Forum that dairy producers were preparing for labor losses from mass deportations and prioritizing reforms to legal foreign worker pathways. 

“As we do more on mass deportations, we’re going to have to find some way to make the legal process work,” Dykes said. ”We need a workforce.”

February

Feb. 3, 2025

After speaking with the leaders of Mexico and Canada, and separately announcing he secured commitments to bolster border security, Trump delayed tariffs that were set to go into effect on both countries.

Feb. 26, 2025

Farm groups appealed to the Senate Agriculture Committee for reforms to the H-2A visa program.

March

March 31, 2025

Jaime Castaneda, executive vice president for policy development and strategy with the National Milk Producers Federation, discussed Trump’s stance on illegal immigrants and its impact on the dairy sector on an episode of Agri-Pulse Newsmakers. 

“We continue to express the importance of foreign workers for the U.S. dairy industry,” Castaneda said.

In the same episode, Torrey Advisory Group Vice President Cassandra Kuball shared that “being able to go out there and indiscriminately do any sweep that may result in taking away farm labor will really have a catastrophic impact on the industry.” 

April

April 10, 2025

At a cabinet meeting, Trump offered farmers some flexibility under the mass deportation program. 

Farmers would be able to “come in with a letter concerning certain people, saying they’re great, they’re working hard,” Trump said. “We’re going to slow it down a little bit for them, and then we’re going to ultimately bring them back. They’ll go out; they’re going to come back as legal workers.”

June

June 10, 2025

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided Glenn Valley Foods, a meat production plant in Omaha, Nebraska. ICE agents detained around 75 workers out of roughly 140 at the plant, according to company President Chad Hartmann. 

June 12, 2025

At a White House ceremony, Trump said farmworkers in the country illegally shouldn’t be deported and reiterated that the administration would be taking action on the issue.

“We’re going to have an order on that coming out soon,” he said, but he didn’t elaborate on what the administration would do about farmworkers.

June 14, 2025

Trump’s administration directed immigration officials to largely pause raids on farms, hotels, restaurants, and meatpacking plants.

“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.

June 15, 2025

In light of criticism that she and Trump were somehow not in agreement on the administration’s direction, Rollins posted on X maintaining she and Trump remained aligned on immigration.

“I fully support President Trump’s America First immigration agenda as stated in his campaign, starting with strong border security and deportations of every illegal alien. This agenda is essential to fixing a broken farm-labor economy and restoring integrity to the American workforce,” Rollins said.

“The president and I have consistently advanced a ‘Farmers First’ approach, recognizing that American households depend upon a stable and legal agricultural workforce. Severe disruptions to our food supply would harm Americans. It took us decades to get into this mess and we are prioritizing deportations in a way that will get us out. This administration is undeniably focused on the America First agenda and my work at the Department of Agriculture is no different,” she said.

June 16, 2025

In a course change, the Department of Homeland Security said it would continue to conduct immigration raids on farms, hotels, and restaurants.

June 19, 2025

After days of confusion, White House border czar Tom Homan told reporters, “The message is clear enough that we’re going to continue doing worksite enforcement operations, even on farms and hotels.”

When asked about guidance to hold off at ag and hospitality sites, Homan said, “It’s a matter of proper messaging.” He said the worksite enforcement would continue “but based on a prioritized basis. Criminals come first.”

June 20, 2025

Trump again said he wanted to shield farmers from the effects of his crackdown on illegal immigration.

“We’re looking at doing something where, in the case of good, reputable farmers, they can take responsibility for the people that they hire and let them have responsibility, because we can’t put the farms out of business,” the president told reporters.

The same day, Trump’s administration said it was suspending enforcement of a “burdensome” farmworker rule from former President Joe Biden’s administration.

The 2024 rule provided protection for workplace organizing to foreign farmworkers in the U.S. on H-2A visas. The rule had already been suspended because of federal injunctions, according to the Department of Labor.

“The decision provides much-needed clarity for American farmers navigating the H-2A program, while also aligning with President Trump’s ongoing commitment to strictly enforcing U.S. immigration laws,” according to a statement from the department.

June 21, 2025

On an episode of Agri-Pulse Newsmakers, Senate Ag Committee Chairman John Boozman was asked about his message to Trump when it comes to shaping immigration policy that could affect the nation’s food supply.

“I think the biggest problem that we [have] now is uncertainty. One minute, it’s one way, and the next minute, it’s the other way. Who can plan? It really makes it very, very difficult,” he said.

Ultimately, Boozman said next steps would be “getting together a visa program so that we can get the workers that we need and do things in an orderly process.

June 26, 2025 

Pennsylvania lawmakers and ag organizations criticized the Trump administration’s directives toward ICE raids.

Bailey Fisher, Pennsylvania Farm Bureau’s federal affairs specialist, was among them. Among other points, she discussed calls for the industry to just “hire domestic” workers.

“We have tried that. Trust me, we have tried every possible solution you could think of, and the domestic workforce is just not there in the ag industry,” she said. “A lot of Americans, they prefer the office job over getting up at 4 a.m. to go milk a dairy cow or being out in the hot summer heat, picking lettuce, harvesting lettuce, or fruit, etc.”  

Other ag groups also called for a long-term, legislative solution to the farm workforce problem and pushed for lawmakers and the Labor Department to address the ever-increasing adverse effect wage rate that applies to the H-2A program.

July

July 3, 2025

The House of Representatives passed the “big, beautiful bill” and sent it to Trump for signature. The expansive tax and spending cuts package provided more than $170 billion to carry out Trump’s campaign promise of mass deportations of people in the country without permanent legal status.

It also gave the Department of Homeland Security $45 billion for the detention of immigrants, and immigration enforcement another $30 billion to hire up to 10,000 ICE agents.

At an Iowa rally the same day, Trump reiterated his willingness to let migrant laborers stay on farms, speaking about a plan to protect them from the possibility of being detained by ICE agents during workplace raids.

The White House remained quiet about any details about the president’s plan.

July 8, 2025

Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds said Iowa officials had contacted the White House to be involved in discussions on how to keep immigrant agricultural workers in the country.

The same day, Rollins said there would be “no amnesty” for agricultural workers as the administration moved to deport all immigrants in the country illegally, noting the administration’s goal was a 100% American workforce.

July 19, 2025

Congresswoman Andrea Salinas shared about small, targeted raids in her Oregon district on an episode of Agri-Pulse Newsmakers. She said producers were “nervous about the ICE raids.”

In the same episode, Michael Marsh from the National Council of Agricultural Employers said migrant workers were scared and distracted at work. “We are very interested in some of the remarks made by the president, however, about figuring out a way or some kind of plan to perhaps help workers who are here.”

Another guest, Rebeckah Adcock with the International Fresh Produce Association said, “We are definitely feeling it, [and] we’re definitely seeing it, but we’re also working very collaboratively with the administration to communicate who agriculture is, why it’s important, [and] why the farm workers that we have are important, whether they’re coming from another country or the few that are domestic.”

July 30, 2025

It was reported that the JBS meat production plant in Ottumwa, Iowa, had begun issuing 200 deportation notices to employees from Haiti, Cuba, Guatemala, and Nicaragua. This was according to the mayor of Ottumwa. 

July 31, 2025

In the midst of the uncertainty, farmer groups want Trump to intervene and signal that H-2A legislation is a priority. 

“Congress is going to have to act, and Congress isn’t likely to act until the president gives them clear direction that this is what he wants them to do,” said National Council of Farmer Cooperatives President and CEO Duane Simpson.