Self-imposed lockdowns, surveillance fears and forced separations: life for California's undocumented farmworkers

The Guardian

2 days ago

Driving into the Salinas valley, about two hours south of San Francisco, hand-painted signs fly by, advertising cherries, pistachios, avocados and garlic.
From above, the valley looks like a quilt stitched together out of a thousand shades of green – the fields of lettuce, spinach and strawberries that give the region its nickname, 'the salad bowl of the world'.
Undocumented farm workers form the unseen backbone of this fertile, year-round agricultural powerhouse, where perfect growing conditions and staggered harvests keep fresh produce flowing non-stop.
Tucked in behind a vineyard, in the early morning mist, a crew of farm workers have been cutting cauliflower plants with machetes since 5.30am, while another crew piles the plants into rows.
The Guardian spoke to more than a half-dozen Spanish-speaking farm workers at two farms in Salinas Valley about the unprecedented militarized raids on farms, factories, courthouses and other spaces in California this summer, and how the fear they have caused is affecting their lives, families and dreams for the future.
Peligro, 52, is the majordomo overseeing the harvest. Despite his nickname, which means 'danger' in Spanish, Peligro has a gentle face and an infectious laugh when he banters with his crew of workers.
He moved to Salinas from Guadalajara in Mexico at 18, and all three of his children were born in the US. His eldest son is 22 and would ordinarily be able to sponsor Peligro's green card, but because Peligro entered the country without authorization, he would first have to leave the country and risk being banned from re-entering for 10 years.
Peligro's mother, who is 81, has a visa to visit the US, but doesn't want to come because of the political climate. The last time he saw her was when he got married three years ago, and though he sends her money for medicine, he wonders if he will ever see her again.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) raids that have swept California this summer have his crew on edge, even though there have yet to be Ice raids on farms here in Salinas valley, according to the Rapid Response Network in Monterey county, where Salinas is located.
About half of the US's 2.4 million agricultural farm workers do not have legal status, according to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), and that number is even higher in California.
It's unclear what percentage of farm workers in Monterey county – one of the California counties with the highest number of farm workers – have legal status, but scanning his crew of 25 workers, Peligro counts only one citizen, two who have visas and two who are currently protected by Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca), the 2012 program that gives work permits and temporary status to undocumented migrants who came to the US as children. That means that in this field, 80% of workers are undocumented.
The political climate for these workers is leading to chronic hyper-vigilance – a self-imposed lockdown eerily reminiscent of the pandemic's earliest days, but with the additional, ever-present fear of surveillance, disappearance and forced separation from one's US-born children.
Workers feel safest at home or here in the fields, Peligro said, so the roads, gas stations, shops and public spaces they once crossed every day now feel treacherous.
'Do you think Americans will do this work?' Peligro said, then immediately answered: 'If they do, they won't do it for $17 an hour. It's really hard work.'
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Over a 9am meal of tortillas, chicken and pasta salad, Lupe, 39, from Jalisco, said she moved here at 13 with her whole family. She made it through three years of high school, learned English and is currently protected from deportation by Daca.
But Lupe's current legal status doesn't stop her from fearing deportation: 'I'm watching the news and they're taking people with Daca and visas too.' (Earlier this year, a deaf Daca recipient was swept up in an Ice raid near Los Angeles and was detained for nearly a month, despite his status.)
As a single mother and main breadwinner for six children ranging from three to 19, she feels a lot of pressure.
'We're scared. When we go to the store to get groceries, we have the feeling that someone is following us. Sometimes we don't want to go to the doctor or dentist,' said Lupe.
She depends on federally funded food assistance, healthcare and pre-school (which are all facing major cuts under the Republicans' new budget bill), and fears this could make her an easy target for Ice agents to track down. She said: 'They have all my information, but small kids have to go to the doctor and the dentist.'
As the AP recently revealed, Ice officials are getting access to the personal data of nearly 80 million people on Medicaid in order to identify and locate 'aliens in the United States', forcing people to choose between seeking emergency medical help for themselves or their children, or risk deportation and family separation.
Lupe is most fearful for her extended family, almost all of whom are undocumented. 'It's bad news every day. I can't live my life like before,' she said. Her mom, who is here on a tourist visa from Mexico, is too scared to take her kids out to the park, so they're spending the summer indoors in their small, cramped house.
Cooking, cleaning the house, doing laundry and watching action movies is what helps her take her mind off the news of Ice raids.
'We are hard-working people. We don't come here to take anyone's jobs,' said Lupe. 'We just want to do what we're doing free from fear and be the support for our families.'
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Elvia moved to Salinas 19 years ago from Guanajuato.
In addition to her work at the cauliflower farm, Elvia is a member of Líderes Campesinas, an organization that advocates for the human rights of farm-worker women across California. She helps fellow farm-worker women navigate resources, fill gaps related to food insecurity, and organizes to create healthier working conditions.
She is one of the two workers in this cauliflower field who has a visa. It's a special kind of non-immigrant visa that protects victims of crimes who suffered substantial mental or physical abuse while in the US.
Still, she doesn't feel the visa will protect her. 'It's scary and frustrating to have to go out to work not knowing if we'll return home.'
Elvia survived domestic violence by her former husband, who was deported back to Mexico. Her 18-year-old daughter, who is finishing high school and wants to study to be a teacher, is particularly on edge these days. She witnessed the violence against her mother and fears Elvia could be deported back to her former abuser.
'She's always crying, fearing there will be a separation,' said Elvia about how the Ice raids have reopened old wounds for her eldest daughter.
Since then, Elvia remarried and also has two other children, ages three and six.
After being diagnosed with PTSD, Elvia got therapy and learned some tips for coping with stress.
'Before, I used to scream a lot,' she said. 'Now, I'm trying to find other ways, so that I don't transmit my stress to my small children.'
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Alba, 58, moved to Salinas 30 years ago from the port city of Acapulco.
It's been 25 years since she's seen her mother in person and wonders if they will ever meet again. They FaceTime, and Alba sends her money to pay for her arthritis and osteoporosis medicine. She wants to eventually retire in Mexico, but fears that if she returns now, or gets deported by Ice, she won't be able to come back to the US and make enough money to pay for her mom's medicine.
'My dream is to have a house where I could welcome my mom and get her visa,' Alba said.
After work, which ends at about 2.30pm, Alba used to go to watch the ocean waves lap on the beach in Monterey, or go shopping, but now she stays home and tends to her roses. On her phone's photo roll, she pulls up a rainbow of flower pictures she's grown with the little outdoor space she has access to. She grows tomatoes, flowers, chilli and yerba buena.
Alba knows many people who qualify for the supplemental nutrition assistance program (Snap) but don't apply for it in case it could somehow hurt their immigration status in the future. During the first Trump administration, a 'public charge' rule was introduced for a little more than a year to make it harder for people to get visas or green cards if they used or had used public nutrition, housing and health programs.
Until recently, Alba would work six days a week, for up to 10 hours a day, but a new law requiring overtime pay means that farms hire workers for a maximum of 40 hours a week. She would like to see land be made available to farm workers so that they could grow their own crops and sell the bounty themselves.
Líderes Campesinas, for which Alba is on the Salinas organizing committee, currently has a bill before the state assembly that would help people in worker cooperatives and non-profit cooperatives, like Alba, access such land.
For now, she has managed to find space to garden in the back of a church, which this year opened a community garden with half a dozen raised beds, fitted with irrigation. Walking around the church garden, Alba shows off all the herbs, tomatoes and strawberries she's been growing under a giant walnut tree.
Maria has been picking and weeding lettuce, broccoli, artichoke and more up and down the Salinas valley since 2007.
'We live day to day with this fear,' said Maria over a tamarind soda in the corner of a restaurant where she felt safe enough to meet. 'I've always lived with the fear that they [Ice] might pass us, but today it's much bigger.'
Like Alba, Maria used to go to the beach or go shopping after work, but these days she goes straight home to her three daughters, 10, 12 and 17, who 'are panicking and stressed', wondering if she'll make it home from work or get taken away by Ice.
'My daughters have fear, panic and tremors with anxiety,' said Maria.
Ten years ago, when her eldest was seven and the others were still babies, Maria's husband went out to buy bread and milk for the kids and never came back. She said he was detained by Ice, deported to Mexico and they haven't seen him in person since, though they speak over the phone.
Maria doesn't have a backup plan for her daughters if she gets deported. She doesn't trust anyone. When her eldest turns 18, she hopes she can transfer custody to her for the younger girls, if necessary.
But her 17-year-old, despite years of therapy, suffers from 'nervous breakdowns' and engages in self-harm, Maria said. When she goes to work, Maria tries to leave her with a babysitter. Listening to music helps to calm her daughter's nerves.
'It's hard as a mother to be in such insecurity. I don't want to leave her alone,' said Maria, so the prospects of transferring custody to her feel unimaginable.
The constant uncertainty and panic, she said, was 'like a thorn stuck in your side that's constantly pricking'.
The Guardian is not using the full names of the people in this article to protect them and their families