Raise the farm worker wage. If Americans don’t take the jobs, put prisoners and welfare recipients (Welfare for Work) on the farms.
22
Illegal immigration is the issue that got Trump elected and will get him re-elected. He has my vote on this issue alone.
29
Immigrants are now trying to run US cities into the ground on behalf of illegal immigrants. They also forget they will lose money from the census as inmates are counted as part of local communities. The sad part is many of these illegal farm workers are migrant and they or their children will eventually leave McFarland.
And why wouldn't they? The City will lack the funding to maintain infrastructure like its streets, schools, buildings and parks. Funding for police and fire protection will cause the City to pay the county for Sheriff's and Fire protection.
All these critical decisions being made by people who are not citizens, pay little to no taxes, display almost no loyalty to the country they have come to illegally and are acting like locusts who move in, eat up the resources (Schools for kids, medical in the Emergency Rooms, welfare, WIC, SNAP, etc.), migrate to the next town when they are done and start the process all over.
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@USVictor I
Immigrants--legal and otherwise--pay as much in taxes an anyone else in their bracket. Their employers withhold US and state taxes using an individual tax ID number if they don't have a social security number. They contribute to social security even though they are ineligible for benefits.
As for eating up resources -- we Americans would have very little to eat at all were it not for the labor of new immigrants.
146
$500,000 from the detention center to the city doesn't seem like a lot of money. If this ever goes through, the city should ask for more money.
7
A great leader or group of leaders in McFarland should rise up and turn this into a positive situation. If the state already owns the two prisons slated for closure, and they are slated for receiving contracts with ICE, the citizens should open a non-profit facility owned by the community. You have the opportunity to open the nation's most enlightened detention center, with a strong, yet compassionate charter. Gear the work to assist non-violent detainees, find more humane ways to detain them, and better ways to house and educate illegal immigrant children. Study countries with best practices for detaining and treating illegal immigrants as a caring nation. Form your own type of detention center - make it a true American enlightenment story, Then your citizens, not a faceless corporation, will create the jobs and receive the financial influx of money YOU deserve.
16
Congratulations to the residents of this town for stopping this! All of the claims that the detention center will bring prosperity to this rural town are lies - they will benefit some, but very few in the locality. I'm proud of my brothers and sisters for standing up to these corporate interests that place profit over people.
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GEO is in the business of locking up people, taking away their freedom. How do the people who work there sleep at night? This company wouldn't even exist without government privatization. I'm proud that we in California voted to end private prisons. The government should be solely responsible for carrying out court-mandated sentences.
52
Actually McFarland sounds like a good town for an ICE detention center, close to the source as it were.
30
@somsai Ditto!!
8
That's local control. Isn't that dear to the conservative heart?
21
So it says,"undocumented for 20 years" in the article.
My God!!!
Who needs immigration enforcement?
Sort give more credence to the president policy of holding more folks in Mexico as a stop gap until this matter is worked out.
Twenty years undocumented with 4 US born children. How does this happen?
Lawless!!!
Won't last though!!
29
Any easy solution is to fine companies who hire undocumented workers. Why isn’t that happening? That would be too easy of a solution wouldn’t it?
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Where does the city's budget come from? Is it sales taxes, paid by the undocumented and the citizens both, on every taxable purchase? Is it property taxes, paid by homeowners and undocumented and citizen renters, through their landlords? Is it state budget grants, from state taxes, withheld from both undocumented workers and citizens? Is it federal grants, from taxes withheld from both undocumented workers and citizens?
The city government must be responsive to the needs and desires of -all- of the people living there. If all the undocumented workers move away - (or, as Trump and his cult would prefer, "go back were you came from") - who will pick the grapes, almonds, pistachios and citrus that grows all around this town? Will US citizens will move to McFarland to work hard picking crops, for what these undocumented workers get paid? What happens to farmers; what happens to orchard and vineyard owners, when the undocumented farm workers are gone -- pushed out, scared away, or deported? Will Trump expand his farmers bailout here, to pay them off; more payoffs covering up his foolish policy choices?
We can't have it both ways, cheap food and "no illegals". Trump and Republican politicians need to stop demonizing immigrants for political advantage, and address this very complex problem with a comprehensive solution. Trump needs to stop the campaign-rally spite-chants, profiteering detentions, and incendiary sloganeering that serve as his 'immigration policy' now.
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@Jim Brokaw
Your comments, especially those in the first paragraph, are indisputable. I have served on two City Councils, and believe me, when we went over the annual budget, we didn't say, "what was the immigration status of the people who paid these funds?" We have a 9% sales tax rate in my town. I live in a million dollar house and pay it. So does the guy in line behind me at the store who lives with 10 other people in a 2 bedroom apartment. Same thing at the gas station. We both pay around $.80/gallon in taxes. I need gas to drive around in town. He needs it to come over and cut your lawn.
"We can't have it both ways, cheap food and "no illegals"." This says it best. To think otherwise is delusional.
When I see overweight, sunburned middle-aged Caucasians bent over picking crops in the fields, I will reconsider my thoughts on this matter.
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I wonder what would happen if I lived in Mexico "illegally" and protested their local government?
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@Aaron Go there and report back to us.
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@Aaron Nothing. I can guarantee there's a sizeable number of US citizens in Mexico who overstayed their visas, and nobody particularly cares.
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For the record. California was purchased from Mexico, among other southwest states, via this treaty: Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848.
State-hood 1850.
https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=false&doc=26.
It seems it is a broken state now with the massive homeless population and this stuff.
Its current travails will not last forever.
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@DAWGPOUND HAR
"Its current travails will not last forever."
I appreciate your confidence in California's ability to innovate and create solutions, for which we are recognized around the world.
23
We have had immigrant labor in this country since the day it was founded. First there were the slaves, Africans who were kidnapped and then introduced to forced labor, owned by the same people who owned the land. Then we had the Irish , the Italians, the Jews, and others from different countries, all fleeing their native countries for a better life. They were treated by the residents much like today's immigrants. Ridiculed for not knowing English and using the customs of their native land.
Today immigrants stand out because of their brown skin and the language they speak. No one praises them for the work they do; the hard labor white people refuse to do. They fill the jobs on the kill floors of the meat packing plants and toil in the fields and the orchards bringing the food we eat to the tables of all Americans. And to show our gratitude, we make them live with the fear of jail and deportation.
Unless your genetic makeup is 100% Native American, then your roots lie in the soul of a former immigrant who came here seeking a better life.
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@allen roberts enslaved Africans were not immigrants.
Thank you.
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@allen roberts
"We have had immigrant labor in this country since the day it was founded."
And before that we had slave labor ..believe it or not- 100% Native Americans were some of the earliest salve owners from the colonial period until the civil war. YES, Native American tribes owned black slaves. So when Bernie is elected and slave reparations are paid, I hope to see the Native American casino money contribute to the pot.
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@allen roberts Not all Africans were kidnapped. Some were sold by their chiefs.
14
97k for an entry level position?!
Yes, yes, immigration, inmates running the asylum, but that just stands out. 97,000 a year entry-level? Yowsa.
12
They aren't "undocumented immigrants", they are illegal aliens. They need to be rounded up and deported, every last one of them.
And the people who hire them should be jailed.
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@Etaoin Shrdlu Then Republicans would be in jail.
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@Etaoin Shrdlu
I am surprised that you are not more supportive of people coming to this nation to improve their lot in life, if even for their children. People come from many countries around the globe, including those whose former citizens have difficult to pronounce names.
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@John E.
The issue isn't the intent of the undocumented immigrants, but how they realize their intent.
To the point: International air travelers require documentation to enter the US legally; arranging to enter the country without permission should not exempt the "traveler" from the law.
10
Just think - without these "undocumented" workers, we might have to pay more for our fruits, vegetables, and nuts.
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@J. Waddell
+60% of Americans are obese.. I highly doubt they would care if the price of fruits, vegetables and nuts went through the roof.
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@J. Waddell
... or maybe not: The threat of higher prices is the reflexive response when there is discussion about restoring manufacturing to the US; returning American workers to existing manufacturing jobs--or employing Americans to work on a farm (... and with enthusiasm for vegan and vegetarian diets, the time is ripe to hire "local" labor to gain hands-on "farm-to-table" experience!)
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@J. Waddell I’m willing to pay 25 cents more for produce.
12
Mon Ray, funny how you don’t mention the companies illegally hiring undocumented workers.
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Is there nothing that can be built to expand tax base besides incarceration centers????? This is America?
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I’m not sure a whole lot of communities would want their subsistence reliant on abhorrent organizations like ICE or private, for-profit prisons. I know I sure wouldn’t want them in my town and that aversion has nothing to do with my citizenship (or in the case of the residents of McFarland, lack thereof). Plenty of majority US-citizen communities would balk at having GEO and ICE run centers in their towns as well.
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@Max If we didn't turn our eyes from massive lawlessness so we can have cheap grapes and almonds we wouldn't need ICE detention centers and our underemployed would have temp jobs that pay lots of money.
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@somsai
It would not be "lawless" if we reformed our laws to be in compliance with our economic needs, our history, and our values.
The Farm Workforce Modernization Act is a move in the right direction.
14
This sounds like an economically justifiable proposal, put the facility in existing structures that are well located to the population of presumed occupants.
9
Obviously the counter protesters from Adelanto got it wrong-they were not just putting criminal immigrants into their detention facilities but those "who recently crossed the border" which pre-trump was a civil not a criminal charge where people would have been released to relatives and sponsors pending court hearings. Watch for the next stories about how ICE rounds up everyone mentioned in this story. I wish you wouldn't use the names of these folks who have worked hard in this country for 20 years. That counts for nothing with the evil in charge of the white house.
20
It's really important that we slow the expanding immigration detention role of private prison companies like GEO and CivicCore.
As justice reform admirably reduces the American prison population, these companies look to fill their beds and their pockets, replacing low level American offenders with people exercising their legal right to seek asylum in our country.
And, as this story makes clear, once they've insinuated their tax-paying business into a low-income rural community, it requires financial sacrifice to let them go.
10
Having two ICE detention facilities there is like being a little bit pregnant. Prisons for profit have to be filled to make money, and the town has 7500 undocumented workers.... What's to worry about?
11
Something is very wrong if ANY community depends on a prison to anchor their community's economy.
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The idea that non voting undocumented people had a decision in this is ignorant to say the very least, Mon Ray. The ranchers and farmers don’t want to lose their workforce.
5
Anyone who really wants to fill the jobs performed by migrant workers, should just move to the town and do them. Crops all over the Country have rotted in the fields because people who had been coming to the US for decades to harvest, are no longer allowed to cross the border.
Why not convert the prisons into useful buildings for small businesses; it could attract new residents who would need new residences and would create new tax revenue. That could create construction jobs and demand for goods/services.
Or convert the prisons into trade schools teaching green renewable energy skills. One prison could house the schools and the other residences for students.
The town needs to start thinking outside the box...
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@Sasha
The town needs to start thinking outside the (6' x 8') box... :)
4
@Sasha as long as we allow unrestricted immigration if illegal and low wage labor no jobs will ever pay enough to support middle class families. Former prisoners will have nowhere to work for a livable wage, our streets will continue to fill with the homeless. All the education in the world is useless without a job.
10
@somsai
I agree: Instead of defending the low-wage immigrant labor, challenge the employers to pay a living wage to Americans.
17
Bravo! Repel ICE and their mission of intimidation, subjugation, persecution and abuse. At the very least the residents will sleep well knowing they did the right thing, the charitable thing when confronted by government and corporate evil. How these employees sleep at night is beyond me. Maybe they never heard that the Nuremberg Defense is no defense at all.
21
ICE will simply locate a detention center somewhere else. It means that undocumented residents of McFarland detained by ICE won’t be held in McFarland.
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@William Case
We are getting better at thwarting ICE storm troopers in California (sent them packing in Santa Rosa this week). They may decide to take on lower-hanging fruit elsewhere. Resist.
9
I find it interesting that no mention is made of the landowners who employ these immigrants taking a stand on the issue. I’m sure they have considerable political sway in the region. Do they honestly believe that if the immigrants are all swept away there will people lined up to take those jobs.
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@Jean Sims
Yes, of course, they have sway. And they are using it to help the people who work for them do so with a little more security and dignity -- while making it less burdensome for them and for California's 420,000 farmworkers -- 60-75 % of whom are undocumented -- to produce the fruit and vegetables that Americans consume.
On their behalf, Representative Zoe Lofgren has spearheaded the Farm Workforce Modernization Act which has passed the House and will move to the Senate.
This Act would expand the H2-A visa program, allowing for year-round as well as seasonal workers to qualify, and giving long-term workers -- those here for a decade or more -- an opportunity to apply for a green card.
Let's hope the Senate can get past the loud nativists in their ears and do what's right.
18
The very idea of private prisons and detention centers for the housing of immigrants is a sheer obscenity, a product of the minds of greedy businesses and corrupt politicians. How would the prisons maximize their revenue and profit without wanting to rope in more and more immigrants?
It's a modern version of the old slave trade when the white man caught and captured Africans in their native lands, transported them to Europe and the Americas to be sold as slave labor. Now, of course, we are more evolved than we were in the 16th and 17th centuries. Now we do not have to negotiate the rough seas to venture into far off places to capture the natives for business. Now we capture them right in our backyards, put them in cages, and bill the government for our efforts. Essentially, the same old slave trade by a different name, under different norms.
The new self-proclaimed Chief Law Officer of the country must be having the time of his life. He must be saying to himself - and to his minions and Millers - bring them with ropes around their neck, as many as you can, like 'they used to do in the good old days'.
17
@IWaverly ur somewhat off here. Europeans did not ventured into the dark jungles of west Africa to get their slaves.
They had help:
http://ldhi.library.cofc.edu/exhibits/show/africanpassageslowcountryadapt/introductionatlanticworld/african_participation_and_resi
From a descendant of enslaved Africans -Americans. Not voluntary immigration.
Thanks.
7
Prisons do not help economically develop towns. They are often peddled around to poor towns on the basis of this lie. McFarland should not be fooled.
The only people who receive jobs are generally already-employed members of corrections unions who do not live in the local are. Even if people from the local area do get hired, you’re talking maybe a few dozen jobs. That doesn’t offset the stigma that attaches to a place for being associated with something as disgusting as an ICE detention center. And it doesn’t offset the economic damage done by needlessly locking people up.
If we’re looking for solutions for economic development in rural areas like McFarland, prisons and detention centers are not the answer. They are places of torture and violence that provide zero value to the economy. There are plenty of other public works projects that could benefit this town, such as green initiatives.
27
Can we all just take a moment to mediate on the utter insanity of for-profit prisons?
No wonder Bernie Sanders is huge right now. This country has beyond passed the point of jumping the shark in capitalism and "outsourcing" to "contractors."
Brava to the residents of McFarland, documented or not. They're doing the good work that most of us who are citizens refuse to engage in.
61
The fact that California has outlawed private prisons is the best news I have heard in awhile. I hope that other states will follow California's lead and do the same. As long as we have a Republican controlled Senate, there is zero chance that the federal government will do the same.
33
One can be against private prisons and against illegal immigration. The private prison is a bad idea, as is letting illegal immigrants drive policy decisions.
I fear too many will read this story and think you have to support one or the other. You do not.
26
@Sam The community spoke their values. That some in the community are not documented residents makes no difference.
More of us should be as participatory.
12
@MCD
A googolplex* recommendations for your comment.
* The world's second largest number with a name.
So the town's going to go under--no police or firefighters, a huge debt--and lose good paying jobs, and that tax base, because people here illegally don't want something.
And then they'll have to move anyway.
Illegal immigration is going to break this country apart.
50
Prisons shouldn’t be used as public works projects for economic development. That is not their purpose. But because people have treated this as acceptable, prisons have proliferated and, indeed, become a very lucrative business. The towns where prisons are located are sold lofty promises about all of the economic benefits that will come. These promises are almost never realized.
Prisons are isolated from the rest of the economy and almost never interact with the local economy. GEO, like most prison builders, almost certainly already has supply chains that do not include businesses in this town. It almost certainly already has employees ready to staff this prison who do not live in the local area who would commute from further away to work here (this is almost always the case with prisons). Prisons just consume taxpayer dollars and offer nothing to the towns in which they are located.
Prisons are not economic stimulus. If we want to do that, there are plenty of other public works projects.
32
@Talbot Who is going to pick the strawberries. Answer that question first! Make these people legal. Give them a temporary work visa or what not but please, don't pretend you or you family are deprived of a great job.
42
@Talbot Not all of what you say is going to happen.
If most of the residents, who supported this rejection, are field workers, they already are underpaid, already are working at the mercy of labor contractors and big ag who profit from their undocumented status and resultant low pay and, often, abuse. The put up with long hours in bad weather, pesticide exposure and more, just so that we can have almonds and pistachios to snack on.
They know what the consequences of their actions are far more than we do. They live them every day.
25
the concept of private prisons is a disgrace. I formerly worked in this area, and the absence of adequate public necessities, (clean drinking water, the most egregious example), have caused underprivileged citizens in this part of the central valley much damage. I applaud the undocumented and documented citizens that live in the California farm belt in unifying to oppose this potential ICE facility. It would greatly benefit their case if the owners / employers of the extremely profitable crops that their workers plant and harvest in desert heat in the brutal summers would also stand with them to support their courageous actions.
57
Entry-level officers are to get 3 times the salary of prison guards in a for-profit facility immigration detention facility??? How can this be possible? Ultimately it is still taxpayers footing the bill. Talk about a boondoggle...
57
What are the opinion of the farmers who own the crops that these immigrants harvest?
25
@Eileen You mean the ones who knowingly use illegal labor in their business? They should be arrested!
30
@Eileen I live and work with many of the farmers here in the central valley, and regardless of their opinions on other political issues, many are in favor of a pathway to citizenship for undocumented farmworkers. Farmers are facing a huge labor shortage and no one else is willing to do the work. Many farmers work for years with the same workers, and see that they are just hardworking families trying to build a better life for their kids. Everyone here knows that if we cracked down on employers hiring undocumented workers, we would have no fresh fruits and vegetables to eat.
31
@John Galt Then all farms and restaurants in this country have committed crimes. Let's lock all of them up.
5
Just watch the movie McFarland and you will feel even more sympathy for the residents of this town. BTW, look at the photo of the "GEO executives": a monogramed custom shirt and an Apple watch - nice touch!
29
@Henry K.
We had a large company wanting to build an obscene project in the small town where I used to live. At the first City Council meeting about the subject, about two dozen men showed up in suits, ties and wingtips. After we ridiculed both their plan and their attire, they showed up at the next meeting "dressed down"- Calvin Klein jeans and alligator boots. Uproariously loud laughter ensued again. A small citizens group fought them (I was a leader) and despite their threat of unlimited campaign finances ("...we will bury you at the ballot box"), we beat them and they departed town never to be seen again. One of my finest moments- "Si se pudo”
Always stand up for what is right.
16
With continued rulings by the courts against ICE and CBP for the mistreatment of immigrants it is appalling that these agencies are now turning to the private sector to do their dirty work for them. It is the state of California's right to prohibit private prisons as they have done. It is not OK for the government to subsidize private prisons by now making them federal holding facilities. Immigration reform is needed now more than ever and we won't get that with republicans in office. November can't get here fast enough.
112
Wonderful! A poor, raggedy, starved man with two small children in tow would be housed in a defunct (i.e., old, scabby, rundown, no longer fit to house felons) prison for the profit of a corporation. Only where one person who has not been oppressed, starved, chased from home needs to rely on good Christians for help. And where those who refuse to join in the profit are accused of bullying the rest into doing something that should have been natural.
11
For profit prisons?
You can never run out of prisoners when profit is involved.
148
@Rob Brown Well Put. Best comment I've read so far.
9
There should never be a financial incentive to imprison people, whether born here or not. California is absolutely right to ban this abhorrent practice. Private prisons have only been allowed since the early 1980s, at which point the rate of incarceration increased disproportionally. If you want Exhibit A in how bad it can get, search "kid for cash" scandal on the internet. Some things are more important than money and jobs. Justice and freedom come to mind. No surprise that the "multi-billion-dollar" corporations and ICE are getting the backing of the current administration who prefers the almighty dollar to, well, just about everything.
87
No town should have to choose between economic viability and security for its residents. This article underscores the need to have reasonable discussions now regarding immigration reform. If someone has dedicated 20 years of their life to productively contributing to their community and our country’s greater economy through doing valuable and necessary work, they deserve a path to citizenship.
70