In the U.S., there's hardly a food you could eat that is untouched by immigrant labor.

Whether growing, harvesting, processing, or cooking it, we're not eating without a robust immigrant workforce.

In fact, some 42% of all farm laborers in the U.S. are undocumented. And right now, at the direction of bigoted goons like Stephen Miller, ICE agents are raiding, assaulting, and detaining tax-paying men and women doing back breaking work in fields, orchards, processing plants, and restaurant kitchens.

Not only is it disgusting – it's also an economic disaster.

To meet Miller's obscene "quota" of arresting 3,000 workers per day, ICE agents are masking up, refusing to identify themselves, and sneaking into communities to arrest non-violent people with no criminal backgrounds on the spot.

Thousands of families are too terrified to show up for work. The terror extends to the regular court-ordered appointments with immigration agents and naturalization hearings as they move through the process toward legal status, as ICE is using these regular appointments as a honey-pot to trap legal immigrants and arrest them.

It all leads to broken families, indefinite detentions, little to no due process, little to no contact with their families, and deportations to countries they have no association with.

Economically, it means the possible loss of billions of dollars worth of produce and other foods.

It means huge labor shortages, farmers watching crops rot in the field, skyrocketing prices for consumers, importing foreign-grown foods at tariff inflated prices, and empty shelves at the grocery store.

California alone, a heavy target for ICE, produces over 75% of our supply of fruits and nuts and over 30% of all our vegetables.

President Trump promised to work with farmers and put energy and investment into the agriculture sector. What we've gotten is changed minds, chaotic back-and-forth, and promises that can't be trusted.

The facts are this: the U.S. can't operate without immigrant labor. Farmers will take huge losses. Consumer costs will hike again and again.

President Trump must stop Stephen Miller and his fanatical crusade and put this country back on the path to prosperity: harvesting fields on time, increasing exports, a workforce that knows it's safe to show up for work, and a path to legal status that is both quick and compassionate.

Heidi

Heidi Heitkamp, Former U.S. Senator for North Dakota
Founder, One Country Project