FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Jimena de Haro, jimenad@cdmigrante.org
Migration that Works Condemns Administration’s Expansion of H-2A Guestworker Program to Dairy Operations Amid Rolling Back of Critical Worker Protections
Washington, D.C. — Migration that Works strongly disapproves of the recent policy directive expanding the deeply flawed H-2A agricultural guestworker program into the dairy sector. Released by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) on June 17, 2026, Policy Memorandum PM-602-0200 systematically opens the door for dairy employers to access H-2A visas, expanding a program with a notorious and documented history of systemic labor abuses.
It is unconscionable that the administration is expanding the H-2A program without first taking every action within its power to strengthen protections for agricultural workers. Instead of addressing the rampant wage theft, substandard housing, unsafe working conditions and human trafficking that have plagued the H-2A program for decades, the Trump administration has prioritized corporate interests over worker wellbeing. Just last year, the administration announced its intent to rescind an H-2A rule that provided critical protections for agricultural guestworkers, and issued a regulation that reduced migrant H-2A farmworkers’ wages. The Economic Policy Institute has estimated that U.S. farmworkers will see their wages reduced by approximately $3 billion per year as a result of the regulation.
Expanding the H-2A program into year-round sectors like dairy under the guise of temporary or seasonal needs—while gutting the very regulations meant to protect these workers from exploitation—is a dangerous step backward. The administration has chosen to prioritize the demands of employers over the human rights, safety, and economic dignity of the workers who feed this country. We cannot support an expansion of a system that has proven rife with abuse, especially when the administration is actively dismantling critical worker protections. As a matter of principle, temporary visas should not be used to fill permanent jobs. When the immigration system is utilized to fill permanent, year-round jobs, the workers who fill those jobs should be offered a permanent status–in other words, a green card.
Trump’s policy memorandum on dairy jobs and H-2A visas is also a blatant attempt to drastically lower wages for the farmworkers who are employed in the few agricultural occupations that provide steady year-round employment. For example, in California, the biggest U.S. state for dairy production, farmworkers employed on dairies earned just over $56,000 per year in 2024. If those workers were replaced by H-2A workers who were paid the current required H-2A wage in California, they would earn just over $35,000. In other words, dairy farmworkers in California would have their wages reduced by almost $21,000 per year as a direct result of Trump’s policy memorandum. The wage cut in Wisconsin would be almost $19,000, and in New York, $16,500.
Migration that Works calls on the administration to rescind this policy memorandum, which aims to recklessly expand guestworker programs. Instead, the focus must shift toward building a labor migration system that corrects power imbalances and protects the right of workers to leave abusive employers—a system that truly prioritizes farmworker safety, freedom, and fairness.
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Migration that Works is a coalition of labor, migration, civil rights, anti-trafficking organizations and academics advancing a labor migration model that respects the human rights of workers, families and communities and reflects their voices and experiences. Founded in 2011 as the International Labor Recruitment Working Group (ILRWG), Migration that Works is the first coordinated effort to strategically address worker rights abuses across industries and visa categories. MigrationthatWorks.org.
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