Expanded immigration enforcement could put pressure on agricultural economies by reducing the supply of workers available for time-sensitive farm jobs, raising labor costs, or prompting changes in production and sourcing. The risk is real: USDA estimates that 42 percent of hired crop farmworkers lacked work authorization in 2020–22. But that figure is not a count of people deported, and the available evidence does not establish how much any state has lost—or that deportations have already raised grocery prices.
Why could deportations affect agriculture?
Farms rely on workers for jobs that must be done at particular times, including planting, tending and harvesting crops, as well as packing. If enforcement removes workers or discourages them from taking farm jobs, growers could have fewer people available when work is due. A shortage can mean unharvested crops, higher recruitment and wage costs, or both; the effect would depend on the crop, location and timing.
The labor exposure is significant in crop production. USDA’s Economic Research Service (ERS), drawing on the Department of Labor’s National Agricultural Workers Survey (NAWS), estimates that 42 percent of hired crop farmworkers lacked work authorization in 2020–22. The same estimate identifies the other workers by status:
| Share of hired crop farmworkers | Status in USDA ERS estimate |
|---|---|
| 42% | No work authorization |
| 32% | U.S.-born |
| 7% | Naturalized citizens |
| 19% | Other authorized immigrants |
These are survey estimates for hired crop workers, not for all agricultural workers. The legal-status series covers crop farmworkers; it should not be extended to dairy, poultry, hog or all livestock workers. The estimates are also not a count of workers removed by enforcement. See the USDA ERS legal-status estimates.
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A workforce estimate is not a deportation count
The Congressional Research Service (CRS) offers a separate approximation: roughly 327,000 unauthorized workers on U.S. crop-producing farms. It derives that figure by applying the 37 percent lower bound of NAWS’s 2021–22 estimate range (37–47 percent, with a 95 percent confidence interval) to an approximate 885,000 crop-farmworker count from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for 2022. It is therefore a calculation based on a survey bound and a separate workforce estimate—not a direct census, a current count, or an estimate of how many people have been deported. CRS did not identify federal legal-status data for livestock-related farmworkers. Its methodology and discussion are in Unauthorized Farmworkers in the United States.
Which states could be most exposed?
The evidence does not support a reliable ranking of states by deportation exposure or a state-by-state dollar estimate of losses caused by deportations. Large agricultural output alone is not a sound proxy: exposure also depends on how many hired crop workers a state has, which crops they work on, when those crops need labor, how much work is done by direct hires versus contractors, and how extensively employers use H-2A workers.
USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) reports hired farm employment and wages nationally, across 15 multi-state labor regions, and individually for California, Florida and Hawaii. Its Agricultural (Farm) Labor Survey measures direct-hire employment, wages and hours, but it does not provide a comparable, individual-state picture for every state. It also does not establish workers’ legal status or whether an absence resulted from enforcement.
The survey has other limits for assessing total labor exposure: it excludes contract labor and collects no worker demographics. ERS explains the Farm Labor Survey’s coverage on its Farm Labor page. As a result, the published state and regional figures cannot by themselves show which state would face the largest enforcement-related disruption.
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Could crops go unharvested and grocery prices rise?
They could, but neither outcome is established as a measured consequence of deportations. CRS says enforcement actions could cause labor shortages that “may cause reductions in the domestic food supply and higher grocery prices for U.S. families.” That is a conditional risk statement, not evidence that enforcement has already caused a particular crop loss or grocery-price increase.
If a grower cannot find enough workers at harvest, some crops could be left unpicked. If labor remains available but becomes more expensive, the grower may absorb the added cost, change production, or pass some of it along. Food prices also reflect factors beyond farm labor, so the evidence here does not isolate deportations as the cause of any price movement.
What could growers do if labor becomes harder to find?
Growers have several possible responses, but none is an automatic, immediate substitute for workers who are unavailable during a specific harvest window. A 2025 analysis by Philip Martin and Zach Rutledge of the University of California’s Giannini Foundation describes higher labor costs, more mechanization, increased H-2A use and more imports of fresh fruit and vegetables as possible adjustments to the administration’s migration policies. These are potential responses, not findings that each change has already occurred because of deportations. The analysis is available in President Trump and Farm Labor: The Outlook.
- Recruit and pay more: Employers may try to attract workers with higher wages or benefits, which can raise production costs.
- Use H-2A: The program provides a legal route for employers to bring foreign-born workers for temporary seasonal agricultural work, subject to certification and employer obligations.
- Mechanize where feasible: Equipment may replace some tasks, but it is not a universal or necessarily immediate solution for every crop or operation.
- Change what or where they produce: A farm could adjust crops or methods, while buyers may source more produce from elsewhere. These choices can shift costs and supply rather than simply eliminate the disruption.
Can H-2A replace workers who are unavailable?
Not automatically. USDA describes H-2A as a program that lets employers bring foreign-born workers to the United States for seasonal farm labor for up to 10 months. Employers must show that recruitment efforts were unsuccessful and obtain Department of Labor certification; USDA also describes a required wage floor called the Adverse Effect Wage Rate. The program is designed for temporary or seasonal agricultural work, not as a frictionless year-round replacement system.
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CRS reports about 363,000 approved H-2A labor certifications in fiscal year 2024. That figure shows the program’s scale, but a certification is not necessarily the same as a worker arriving, being employed, or replacing a particular absent worker. CRS’s summary of USDA ERS research also says H-2A use is concentrated in produce and specialty-crop operations relative to some other farm types. The program’s terms are described by USDA ERS, and the certification figure and context appear in the CRS report.
Whether H-2A can help in a particular state or harvest depends on recruitment, certification, employer obligations and timing. The national certification total does not show how quickly a specific farm can fill a vacancy.
What do “migrant” and “farmworker” mean in these estimates?
“Migrant” is often used colloquially to mean an immigrant, but migration pattern and immigration status are different things. USDA ERS estimates that 83 percent of hired crop farmworkers were settled in 2020–22, meaning they worked at a single location within 75 miles of home. That finding complicates the idea that most farm labor consists of workers moving from state to state or following crops. It does not change the separate estimate of workers’ legal status. The settled-worker figure is from USDA ERS’s Farm Labor overview.
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