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65–744 PDF 2011

H-2A VISA PROGRAM: MEETING THE GROWING 

NEEDS OF AMERICAN AGRICULTURE? 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

IMMIGRATION POLICY AND ENFORCEMENT 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

APRIL 13, 2011 

Serial No. 112–28 

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://judiciary.house.gov 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

LAMAR SMITH, Texas, Chairman 

F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., 

Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

BOB GOODLATTE, Virginia 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

MIKE PENCE, Indiana 

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas 

JIM JORDAN, Ohio 

TED POE, Texas 

JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah 

TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

TREY GOWDY, South Carolina 

DENNIS ROSS, Florida 

SANDY ADAMS, Florida 

BEN QUAYLE, Arizona 

[Vacant] 

JOHN CONYERS, JR., Michigan 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

ROBERT C. ‘‘BOBBY’’ SCOTT, Virginia 

MELVIN L. WATT, North Carolina 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

STEVE COHEN, Tennessee 

HENRY C. ‘‘HANK’’ JOHNSON, JR., 

Georgia 

PEDRO R. PIERLUISI, Puerto Rico 

MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois 

JUDY CHU, California 

TED DEUTCH, Florida 

LINDA T. SA ́ NCHEZ, California 

DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida 

SEAN MCLAUGHLIN, Majority Chief of Staff and General Counsel 

PERRY APELBAUM, Minority Staff Director and Chief Counsel 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION POLICY AND ENFORCEMENT

ELTON GALLEGLY, California, Chairman 

STEVE KING, Iowa, Vice-Chairman 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

LOUIE GOHMERT, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

TREY GOWDY, South Carolina 

DENNIS ROSS, Florida 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas 

MAXINE WATERS, California 

PEDRO R. PIERLUISI, Puerto Rico 

GEORGE FISHMAN, Chief Counsel 

DAVID SHAHOULIAN, Minority Counsel 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

APRIL 13, 2011 

Page 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

The Honorable Elton Gallegly, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of California, and Chairman, Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and 

Enforcement .......................................................................................................... 1 

The Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of California, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Immigration Policy 

and Enforcement .................................................................................................. 2 

The Honorable Lamar Smith, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Texas, and Chairman, Committee on the Judiciary ..................................... 4 

The Honorable John Conyers, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the 

State of Michigan, and Ranking Member, Committee on the Judiciary ......... 5 

WITNESSES 

Jane Oates, Assistant Secretary for the Employment and Training Administration, U.S. Department of Labor 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 8 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 10 

Leon R. Sequeira, Of Counsel, Seyfarth Shaw LLP 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 59 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 61 

H. Lee Wicker, Deputy Director, North Carolina Growers Association 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 66 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 69 

Bruce Goldstein, President, Farmworker Justice 

Oral Testimony ..................................................................................................... 75 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 77 

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Material submitted by the Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress from the State of California, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee 

on Immigration Policy and Enforcement ........................................................... 19 

APPENDIX 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD

Prepared Statement of the Honorable Judy Chu, a Representative in Congress from the State of California, and Member, Committee on the Judiciary ......................................................................................................................... 93

Prepared Statement of the American Farm Bureau Federation ......................... 94 

Prepared Statement of Cathleen Caron, Executive Director, Global Workers 

Justice Alliance .................................................................................................... 122 

Prepared Statement of the Most Reverend Jose ́ H. Gomez, Archbishop of 

Los Angeles, California, and Chair, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ 

Committee on Migration ...................................................................................... 126 

Prepared Statement of the National Immigration Forum ................................... 130 

(1) 

H-2A VISA PROGRAM: 

MEETING THE GROWING NEEDS OF 

AMERICAN AGRICULTURE? 

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 13, 2011 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION

POLICY AND ENFORCEMENT, 

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, 

Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:01 a.m., in room 

2141, Rayburn Office Building, the Honorable Elton Gallegly 

(Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Gallegly, Smith, King, Lungren, 

Gohmert, Poe, Gowdy, Lofgren, Conyers, and Jackson Lee. 

Staff present: (Majority) George Fishman, Subcommittee Chief 

Counsel; Marian White, Clerk; and David Shahoulian, Minority 

Counsel. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. I call the Subcommittee to order, and good morning to everyone. 

This morning we are going to talk about seasonal agricultural 

labor. As we know, seasonal agricultural labor is a class by itself. 

Unlike almost all other occupations, there are simply not enough 

Americans willing to take the jobs of a migrant farm worker. In 

fact, our Government’s policy for generations has been to remove 

Americans from such labor. 

The labor-intensive branch of agriculture, fruits, vegetables, and 

horticultural specialties hires over 1.2 million individual farm 

workers every year. The U.S. Department of Labor’s National Agricultural Workers Survey annually surveys hired crop farm workers. 

It reveals that over the period between 2007 and 2009, 48 percent 

admitted being in our country illegally. The actual figure may be 

higher. In fact, quite frankly, I am sure it is. NAWS shows that 

85 percent of first-time hired farm workers admit to being here illegally. 

What legal labor force option do growers really have? Since 1986, 

the H-2A program has made available visas for temporary agricultural workers. However, 16 years ago, American agricultural representatives told this Subcommittee that the H-2A program was 

‘‘characterized by extensive complex regulations that hamstring 

employers who tried to use it and by costly litigation challenging 

it use when admissions of an alien worker are sought.’’ They alleged that the Department of Labor was ‘‘opposed to the program.’’ 

2 

Front and center in the growers’ minds was ensuring the availability of sufficient labor to meet the crucial needs like harvesting, 

whose timing varies with the weather. Unfortunately, timeliness 

has never been the H-2A’s strong suit. Neither has realism about 

the availability of domestic labor. 

We are here 16 years later and apparently little has changed. 

The president of the Virginia Agricultural Growers Association, an 

apple grower, has testified that ‘‘were it not for the H-2A program, 

broken, costly, and perilously litigation-prone as it is, we would be 

unable to farm at all . . . One of the most frequently cited reasons 

for our region’s farmers to go out of business is that simply they 

cannot continue under the burdens of the H-2A program.’’ 

The Bush administration’s Labor Department initiated a bold 

plan to revamp the H-2A program. The plan remade the program 

into an attestation-based system designed to ‘‘eliminate cumbersome regulatory practices’’ and speed the guest workers to growers in need. It was also designed to make the costs of the program 

more manageable for the growers. Although it did not resolve all 

the agricultural needs, the regulations received generally positive 

reviews from the grower community. Unfortunately, one of the first 

actions of the Labor Department under the Obama administration 

was to rescind those regulations. 

We will receive testimony today from the Labor Department and 

also from one of the architects of the Bush Labor Department regulations. We will hear from the growers who utilize the H-2A program and try to make the best of it. We will hear from an advocate 

for farm workers who believes the program harms both American 

workers and the guest workers themselves. We hope that this hearing will plant the seed for needed reform. 

And with that, I would yield to my friend, the Ranking Member, 

Zoe Lofgren. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

There is no question that our immigration system is broken, and 

nowhere is that more evident than in our agricultural sector. 

Of the 2 million jobs on Americans’ farms and ranches, more 

than half are held by undocumented workers. The Department of 

Labor estimates that over 50 percent of all seasonal agricultural 

workers are undocumented, and experts believe that due to underreporting, that number may actually be closer to 75 percent. Either 

way, it doesn’t get much more broken than that. 

Our Ag sector has long suffered from the lack of available U.S. 

workers to grow and pick America’s fruit and vegetables. And even 

in today’s tough economic climate, an insufficient number of U.S. 

workers are filling manual seasonal and migrant Ag jobs. 

One reason for this is that Americans are better educated today 

than they were before. In the 1950’s, some 50 percent of the U.S. 

workforce did not have a high school diploma. By 2009, that number had plummeted to 5.7 percent. We as a country are simply 

training our workers to do things other than farm work. 

I could go on and on about the many large-scale attempts to recruit U.S. workers over the years. I could even mention the recent 

Take Our Jobs campaign by the United Farm Workers which we 

explored in a Subcommittee hearing last year with the president of 

the United Farm Workers and another witness whose name esVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:05 Jun 29, 2011 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\041311\65744.000 HJUD1 PsN: 65744
3 

capes me now. But we all know this. We already know that while 

there are U.S. workers in the fields now, whom we have a duty to 

protect, their numbers are shrinking, and we know that if we 

somehow deported the 1 million to 1.5 million undocumented workers on our farms and ranches right now, there are too few Americans jumping at the chance to fill those jobs. And I suspect that 

is why we are having this hearing. 

My colleagues on the other side of the aisle want people to play 

by the rules, as well they should. And we are trying to find a way 

for farmers and ranchers to do just that. I expect we will see increasing pressure in this Congress to find a solution in this area, 

especially as enforcement efforts continue to grow and this Congress considers whether to mandate the use of e-Verify by all employers. 

As I see it, this hearing is really an admission. It is an admission 

that not only do we have a problem, but the solution to that problem involves immigrants. This hearing is proof that our country 

has a need it desperately needs to meet, and it desperately needs 

immigrants to meet that need. 

Discussing the H-2A program is definitely part of finding a solution, but surely we know it is not enough. I hope we can agree that 

the solution to our problem is not to deport 1.5 million farm workers now in our country only to replace them with 1 million to 1.5 

million new temporary workers on a yearly basis. I don’t think that 

is a viable option. On its face, the solution would be inefficient, 

wasteful, and incredibly expensive. 

How many times have we heard my colleagues on the other side 

of the aisle question the ability of the Federal Government to manage even the smallest tasks? I join them now in questioning the 

wisdom of putting an entire industry in the hands of Government 

bureaucrats tasked with the responsibility of moving over a million 

workers in and out of the country every year and ensuring that the 

right workers are in the right location at the right time. 

Indeed, one of the majority’s witnesses will testify today that the 

biggest problem he now faces in getting H-2A workers is getting 

enough consular appointments for visa interviews and background 

checks. Knowing the Chair of the full Committee, as I do, I know 

those requirements won’t be going away anytime soon. Just imagine how much more difficult it will get when we as a country need 

not the 150,000 H-2A workers who were admitted in fiscal year 

2009, but 10 times that many. 

We need to be honest with ourselves and put ideology aside. We 

have over a million undocumented farm workers in this country 

and we need them. Yes, they violated our immigration laws, but we 

as a country also share some of the blame here. For decades, our 

immigration system has not been designed to meet the needs of our 

economy. Dr. Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention, testified at a Subcommittee hearing last year, and we may 

recall his comment. He said we have two signs at the border. One 

says ‘‘no trespassing,’’ and the other says, ‘‘help wanted.’’ 

Our employers, by hiring these workers, and our Government, by 

failing to fix the broken system and looking the other way for 

years, are both complicit here, and to some extent so is the entire 

Nation. These farm workers have filled an important need, and 

4 

each of us has literally benefitted from the fruits of their labor. Not 

only have they fed this country, but they have also kept a critically 

important American industry alive. That industry ensures that we 

don’t have to rely on other countries for food as we do oil. And it 

keeps millions of U.S. workers employed. We must remember that 

every farm workers supports 3.1 upstream and downstream jobs in 

manufacturing, seed production, processing, packaging, transportation, accounting, advertising. Those jobs go to Americans, and if 

we don’t get this right, those jobs go away too. 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today, and I yield 

back the balance of my time. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. I thank the gentlelady. 

At this time, I will yield to the gentleman from Texas, the Chairman of the full Committee, Mr. Smith. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Chairman, there are no jobs Americans will not do, but there 

is one job that neither Americans nor immigrants seem to choose 

if they have other options: seasonal agricultural work. That is why 

many illegal immigrant farm workers who received amnesty in 

1986 soon left the fields for better jobs in the city. As the president 

of the American Farm Bureau has stated, any new amnesty such 

as AgJOBS would have the same result. Because of this, U.S. employers often face a shortage of available American workers to fill 

seasonal agricultural jobs. 

There is no numerical limit to the H-2A temporary agricultural 

work visas. And yet, usage of the program has always been below 

expectations. Why is that? That is the focus of today’s hearing. 

Why don’t more growers who have heavy demands for seasonal agricultural labor make better use of the program? 

In addition to the concerns that Chairman Gallegly has mentioned, growers are troubled by the great cost of using the H-2A 

program, especially the ‘‘adverse effect wage rate’’ that they must 

pay guest workers. Growers also have to provide free housing for 

guest workers and free transportation from the guest workers’ 

home countries. And they are concerned about the ‘‘50 percent 

rule’’—under which they have to offer jobs to all American workers 

who apply even after their guest worker application has been approved and the guest worker has actually arrived. 

In 2008, the Department of Labor concluded that the vast majority of growers, ‘‘find the H-2A program so plagued with problems 

that they avoid using it altogether.’’ In response, the Labor Department issued new regulations to address the concerns of growers. 

The new Bush administration regulations attempted to streamline 

the application process for growers by moving to an attestationbased system in which growers made commitments backed up by 

Department of Labor audits. The regulations sunsetted the 50 percent rule and restricted grower responsibility for transportation expenses only to guest workers who fulfilled at least half of their 

work contract. That makes common sense. The regulations did not 

do away with the adverse effect wage rate but altered its calculation to more reliably mirror local labor cost. 

When the new Administration took office in 2009, it almost immediately sought to suspend the Bush administration’s regulations, 

and that is regrettable because the Administration’s actions made 

5 

the situation worse. When told by a Federal court that it had to 

adhere to the processes of the Administrative Procedures Act, the 

Obama administration Labor Department proposed and then implemented yet more regulations, making the situation yet worse. 

These Obama administration regulations, as noted by the Farm 

Bureau, rolled back common-sense improvements and bring us 

back to the old, problematic system. 

The H-2A program needs to be fair to everyone it impacts, especially American farm workers, guest workers, growers, and American consumers. It must provide growers who want to do the right 

thing with a reliable source of legal labor. It must protect the livelihoods of American workers. It must protect the rights of guest 

workers, and it must keep in mind the pocketbooks of American 

families. 

Just like tilling the land, accomplishing all of these goals will be 

a lot of work. At today’s hearing, we will examine how to improve 

the H-2A program. U.S. farmers need to be able to keep growing 

our crops and our economy. 

Mr. Chairman, let me finally say that I think any solution we 

come up with has to be a bipartisan solution, and for that reason, 

I am sorry to have heard the Ranking Member’s comments a 

minute ago. I thought she was particularly and unnecessarily partisan, and that is not conducive to getting to a bipartisan solution. 

I will yield back. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. At this time, we will yield to the gentleman from 

Michigan, the Ranking Member of the full Committee, Mr. Conyers. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you, Chairman Elton Gallegly. I am starting off here trying to sort out these arguments here. My friend, the 

distinguished Chairman of the full Committee, Mr. Smith, said 

there are no jobs Americans won’t do. I think he went on to explain 

that there were some jobs Americans won’t do. 

But we have had four hearings, starting on January 26 through 

February 10, March 1—this is this Subcommittee—March 10, 

March 31, all immigration hearings. And if I didn’t hear it once, 

I heard it a dozen times from my dear friend from Iowa, Steve 

King, who said essentially let’s deport all immigrants. If he didn’t 

say that at least 10 times, we will go get the record. 

And yes, I will yield to you. Didn’t you say it 10 times? 

Mr. KING. Mr. Ranking Member—— 

Mr. CONYERS. Yes or no? 

Mr. KING. No. 

Mr. CONYERS. Oh, okay. 

Mr. KING. I can expand on that if you would yield. 

Mr. CONYERS. No, I am not going to yield. I just wanted to make 

sure that we were in agreement. 

Now, I will look up the record for you. Fortunately, everything 

that we say in Committees is taken down by a court stenographer 

and transcribed. So I will be prepared to apologize to you real soon 

because I am asking my staff to go start checking that statement 

right now. 

Now, the thrust of all the four hearings I thought—and I stand 

to be corrected again—is that we have got to get rid of immigrants, 

especially illegal immigrants. As a matter of fact, somebody that I 

6 

mistakenly apparently thought was Steve King has said we ought 

to take them all out of the country, all 11 million. There were 12 

million. Now it is down to 11 million. They all ought to be taken 

out of the country. I guess nobody ever said that on the other side. 

I was hearing that. That was a mistake too. 

Well, I am sure you are getting your stories straightened out 

now, my friends, because today’s hearing is about how desperately 

our country needs immigrant workers because we don’t have 

enough Americans to do the job. And so if we don’t get more immigrants into the country, these farms are just going to have to close 

up. 

In the first four hearings, the witnesses for the majority and the 

Members on the majority side said that if we just got rid of the immigrants supposedly who were taking our jobs, employers would 

then increase wages to Americans to take those jobs. 

But in today’s hearings, the majority witnesses will be explaining 

to us that we are paying foreign agricultural workers too much as 

it is. There is going to be testimony, unless somebody changes it, 

that $9 an hour is too much to pay a farm worker, and they want 

to drop the wages to $8 an hour. Not only that, the growers say 

that even $8 is too much for a seasonal migrant farm worker. 

Under current law, growers have to pay for farm workers to travel 

to and from their home country, usually of Mexico. But now the 

growers think that the poor Mexican farm worker is better able to 

pay for these travel costs. 

Now, you will remember the hearings that Chairwoman Zoe 

Lofgren had on this same Committee in which my friend, Stephen 

Colbert, came in here to testify, and I was one of the few that 

didn’t want him to testify. He is an entertainer and he is as smart 

as the devil, and he didn’t come in here to give a serious discussion 

about immigration. 

But Steve King—well, I won’t say Steve King anymore. Somebody on the other side and the majority witnesses argued then at 

that hearing that if we deported the undocumented farm workers, 

Americans would fill their jobs. 

But at today’s hearing, my same colleagues on the other side and 

some more new majority witnesses will say exactly the opposite. 

Today the growers that are here today will testify that we need immigrants to fill jobs on Americans’ farms. And in today’s hearings, 

you are going to hear an interesting solution to the problem. Rather than do something with the million undocumented farm workers 

who have been living here for years, who have raised families, who 

have paid taxes and are now filling the jobs that we need, there 

are some that want to deport these workers and replace them with 

a million new temporary farm workers under the H-2A program 

where they can only stay for—get this—10 months, and then they 

must go back home and then come back if they want to come again. 

And so for this hearing, we have called one of the witnesses, a 

former official of the Department of Labor. As Labor is charged 

with protecting American workers, one would expect him to have 

a pretty good sense of the best ways to ensure good wages and 

working conditions for such workers. But he, this witness, was the 

main drafter of the H-2A rules that were issued by former President Bush just before he left office. These rules sought to lower 

7 

*The information referred to was not available for this hearing record. 

wages for farm workers and eliminated worker protections. In that 

rule, the Department of Labor said that it was necessary to lower 

the wages of foreign workers in order to better protect the wages 

of U.S. workers. And I am going to introduce this for the record.* 

Mr. GALLEGLY. I thank the gentleman. 

Mr. CONYERS. With that, Mr. Chairman, I thank you for allowing 

me to exceed the time, and I will end my statement there. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. I would like to just take a brief moment and respond to a couple things and what my intent is as Chairman of this 

Committee. 

All too often, we have a habit of mixing illegal and legal when 

we talk about immigration. We are a country of immigrants. We 

are also a Nation of laws. And in the previous hearings that we 

have had in this Committee, I have never heard anyone advocate 

the deportation of someone that is legally in this country. And I 

think that we need to be very careful, when we talk about deportation and the issue of immigration, not to mix illegal immigration 

when we talk about a person being an anti-immigrant or opposing 

immigrants being in this country. The reference should be very 

careful. Sometimes these things are mixed for reasons, and I understand the politics of that. 

But we are working today on this issue to look at the issues of 

unmet domestic needs and see if there is a way to do this legally 

through the immigration laws, as we have for 200 years. So let’s 

all try to be sensitive, when we talk about immigrants and deportation, that we refer to legal and illegal and not mix the two. 

We are fortunate today to have two panels of very distinguished 

witnesses, all with very impressive credentials. Each of the witnesses’ statements today will be entered into the record in its entirety, and I would ask that the witnesses please be sensitive to the 

5-minute rule because we have a limited amount of time, unfortunately, as is always the case. But it will give every Member of this 

Committee an opportunity to ask questions and get them on the 

record. And of course, as I said, your written statement will be 

made a part of the record of the hearing in its entirety. 

Our first witness on panel I—in fact, we have only one witness 

on panel I—is Ms. Jane Oates. Ms. Oates served as Assistant Secretary for Employment and Training at the U.S. Department of 

Labor and now leads the Employment and Training Administration. Prior to her appointment, Ms. Oates served as executive director of the New Jersey Commission on Higher Education and senior 

advisor to Governor Corzine. She also served for nearly a decade 

as senior policy advisor to Senator Edward Kennedy. Ms. Oates 

began her career as a teacher and she received her bachelor’s degree from Boston College. 

Welcome, Ms. Oates. And as this time, I will yield to you 5 minutes for your testimony. 

8 

TESTIMONY OF JANE OATES, ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR THE 

EMPLOYMENT AND TRAINING ADMINISTRATION, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR 

Ms. OATES. Chairman Gallegly, Ranking Member Lofgren, and 

Members of the Committee, thank you for the invitation to appear 

to discuss the Department of Labor’s role and administration of the 

H-2A temporary agricultural guest worker program, a program designed to serve a critical workforce need for agricultural employers. 

As the Chairman said, I am the Assistant Secretary of Employment and Training, and the Office of Foreign Labor Certification 

is in ETA and we have the responsibility for the nonenforcement 

H-2A duties. Our friends at Wage and Hour do the enforcement. 

I would like to just spend a few minutes highlighting some of the 

points from my written testimony. 

The Department of Labor has two primary concerns with regard 

to its statutory mandate for the H-2A program. First is maintaining a fair and reliable process for employers with a real need for 

temporary foreign agricultural workers. Second is establishing necessary protections for both U.S. workers and those temporary foreign workers. 

Within the statutory mandate is the important responsibility of 

ensuring that U.S. workers have first access to these jobs. To ensure these mandates are met, the Department implements the H2A regulation and accepts and processes employer-filed H-2A applications for labor certifications. 

For the last 20 years preceding 2008, the Department’s H-2A regulations remained largely unchanged. In 2008, new regulations 

were promulgated which significantly revised the program. A comprehensive review of these changes as the Department changed 

hands demonstrated that these new regulations did not adequately 

satisfy our Department’s mandate to protect U.S. workers. It also 

found that the regulation failed to allow for sufficient, robust, and 

meaningful enforcement. 

To address shortcomings identified in the review, the Department published a final rule which became effective in March 2010. 

As I note in my written testimony, the 2010 final rule in many 

ways reflects a return to the processes and procedures which were 

in place for all but 13 months over a 23-year period. As examples, 

we returned to the documentation of compliance as opposed to selfattestation. We continue to use the USDA Farm Labor Survey as 

the basis for determining the wage rate and we reinstituted the 

role of the State workforce agencies in the housing inspection and 

approval process. 

The Department believes that the provisions in the 2010 final 

rule achieve a reasonable balance between meeting the seasonal 

workforce needs of growers, who are very important to us, while 

still protecting the rights of agricultural workers who are also important to us. The regulation protects the integrity of the program, 

protects workers from potential abuse by employers who fail to 

meet the requirements of the program, and quite frankly, levels the 

playing field for those employers who are and always have played 

by the rules. 

The underlying statutory requirement which governs development and implementation of the regulation, that the employment 

9 

of temporary foreign workers does not adversely affect the wages 

and working conditions of U.S. workers who are similarly employed, has never been more important. 

Many of you on this Committee are still witnessing persistently 

double digit unemployment. The Department takes very seriously 

its obligation to ensure that U.S. workers have first access to these 

jobs. In these difficult economic times, we need to do all that we 

can to make sure that American workers are aware of these opportunities and have the choice to take advantage of them. So in addition to enhancing recruitment, the 2010 final rule created an online 

job registry so U.S. workers could more easily access information 

about and apply for these jobs if they so chose. 

The Department planned and implemented a number of stakeholder meetings and briefings to reintroduce users, growers, of the 

program and many of the features that had been in place prior to 

the 13-month period. Activities included public briefings across the 

country, national webinars, and a question and answer process 

through a dedicated public email box. 

I hope that I will hear lots of questions, and please, I would like 

all the Members of this Committee to know ETA and the Department of Labor are anxious and enthusiastic about working with 

you on all projects related to H-2A regulations. Thank you very 

much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Oates follows:] 

10 


Oates-1.eps
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Oates-2.eps
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Oates-3.eps
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Oates-4.eps
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Mr. GALLEGLY. Thank you, Ms. Oates. 

Ms. Oates, when the H-2A program was originally created, the 

expectations were that applications would be close to or more than 

200,000 guest worker requests per year. However, in the year 2010, 

there were less than 56,000 visas to H-2A workers. Why do you believe that the H-2A program was not used more by the growers? 


Oates-6.eps
16 

Ms. OATES. Congressman, that is a question that we have no 

data. So I can’t give you anything but an opinion, and opinions are 

limiting. So I am open to other opinions. 

I think it is a mix of American workers not understanding what 

these jobs are about and not knowing how to access them. I think 

it is also a mix of folks that have been here before through other 

means taking those jobs with employers. But I have no data to support either of those, and I would feel that I would rather not give 

you a stronger opinion as opposed to undocumented workers or the 

American workers’ willingness or unwillingness to take these jobs. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Don’t you believe that it would be reasonable that 

someone should be asking the question, why are we having only 

one-fourth of what the expectations are? Or do we need to maybe 

downgrade and say that we have maybe four times the number of 

people or do we have one-fourth the number of people we actually 

need? I could see if it was within a 5 or 10 percent margin, but 

when it is 300 percent or 400 percent different, I think that certainly would justify someone reviewing whether the numbers are 

correct or whether it is a problem with the process. Is that reasonable? 

Ms. OATES. Congressman, I not only think it is reasonable, I 

think it is a responsible question and I think it is one that we 

should all be asking and seeking an answer to. Let me tell you a 

little bit about what we are doing to try to get a better answer to 

that. 

As you know, my agency also operates the Unemployment Insurance program and the Workforce Investment System programs so 

that we have a close relationship with the States. We are having 

ongoing and frequent conversations with States about making sure 

these jobs are advertised and trying to get better data about who 

these workers are. Unfortunately, we have limited statutory mandated responsibilities. Those are our first priority, making sure the 

protection piece is there and making sure that we are making these 

jobs available. But I think you and many of the Governors share 

the same concern about figuring out who these workers are, and 

you have our partnership in trying to come up with those answers. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Do you think it is possible that the need is actually closer to 200,000 than 50,000? And if so, do you think it is also 

possible that the regulations or the bureaucracy may be more cumbersome than the benefits of the worker would ultimately be? 

Ms. OATES. Well, I trust employers, so I think that employers are 

giving us accurate information about who they are employing and 

not employing people, you know, in quotes, under the table. So I 

basically have a trust of employers. 

But I would say to you we are open to putting everything on the 

table in terms of investigating what the best next moves are to 

keep the agricultural industry vibrant and to also ensure the rights 

of the workers in those jobs regardless of their documentation status or not. That is not the Department of Labor’s job. We don’t decide documentation. We ensure safety and protection of all workers 

on a job site. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Can you give me your assessment of the wage 

you believe American workers would inquire that would fill the 1.2 

million hired farm worker positions, fruit, vegetable, horticultural 

17 

specialists, growers seek to fill each year? What do you see as what 

the wage rate should be? 

Ms. OATES. Congressman, I see that the wage rate in agricultural jobs just like in any other jobs, as States have the right to 

set minimum wage above the Federal minimum wage. I see that 

as best determined at a local level. That is why I think the AEWR 

is so important. It is a survey done so that—for instance, this year 

some States’ wages went up and other States’ stayed the same and 

some States’ wages went down. I think like many decisions this is 

a decision that needs to be made at the State level. And the agricultural survey allows us to do that. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. I recently talked to some growers in my area. 

Many know I have a very large agricultural area. We would like 

to think of ourselves as the strawberry capital of the world. 

Ms. OATES. We like to use your products. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. A lot of citrus and so on. But celery happens to 

be a crop that I have had my local Farm Bureau folks tell me that 

they have a pretty good documented record that the average pay 

for celery packers, the folks that are cutting the celery in the field 

and packaging them, is between $28 and $30 an hour because they 

work really on a piecework basis. They are not paid that much per 

hour, but when you count the number of boxes—it is so much per 

box—that it does, and obviously they are working very hard to do 

that. But are you aware of numbers like this? 

Ms. OATES. I’m not aware of that and would love to work with 

your growers. 

I will tell you quite frankly in personal experience I have 

picked—I haven’t picked celery or packaged it, but I picked strawberries, and after about 2 hours, I am ready to go home and take 

a long hot bath. These are tough jobs. 

And I don’t think we want to pick out sectors. There are people 

in other sectors that do very difficult, tedious jobs, and they get 

paid for it. So if the local area—if that is the going rate in your 

district, Congressman, I would have to respect it. But again, I am 

more than willing to talk to your growers about whether $28 an 

hour is a fair wage in that area. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Well, when you were picking strawberries, were 

you picking strawberries as an—— 

Ms. OATES. As a mother. 

Mr. GALLEGLY [continuing]. Occupation and as a mother—— 

Ms. OATES. Yes. 

Mr. GALLEGLY [continuing]. Or as an experiment? 

Ms. OATES. Not as an occupation. As you know, so generously 

reading my bio, I was a teacher and, in my teaching responsibilities, often would take my own family out to learn about different 

things. And we lived in Philadelphia and south Jersey is not a 

strawberry capital like your congressional district is, but they do 

have a few plants. And let me tell you it is tedious work. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. But it wasn’t for the wages for the day. It was 

an experiment. 

Ms. OATES. I never earned a wage, purely a volunteer. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. We take a lot of volunteers. 

The gentlelady from California, the Ranking Member, Ms. 

Lofgren? 

18 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you. Before asking my questions, I would 

like to ask unanimous consent to enter into the record statements 

prepared for today’s hearing. The statements are from our colleague, Representative Raul Grijalva, from Arturo Rodriguez, 

President of the United Farm Workers, from the Agricultural Coalition for Immigration Reform, a coalition of growers and grower 

associations from across the United States; and from Karen 

Narasaki, President of the Asian American Justice Center. I would 

ask unanimous consent. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Without objection. 

[The information referred to follows:] 

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Ms. LOFGREN. I think this is a complicated question to some extent and in other ways not. You know, we talk of this as unskilled 

work, but that is not really accurate. A lot of people don’t realize. 

They say, well, these people ought to come here legally, but when 

people say that I don’t think they realize that we have 5,000 permanent resident visas a year for people that don’t have college degrees. Now, they may have high skills, but being a farm worker 

doesn’t require a college diploma. And so the people who have come 

here over the past 20 years to do hard farm work didn’t really have 

an option for the most part, and the farmers who employed them, 

for the most part, did not have options either. 

I don’t hold myself out as an expert, but I do recall my husband’s 

stories of his very short career harvesting carrots in Bakersfield 

where you just couldn’t do it. I mean, the people who knew how 

to harvest it could make some kind of wage. Somebody who was 

just willing to work hard couldn’t do it. 

And I remember in my own district when I was in local government, the mushroom cutters down in Morgan Hill and San Martin 

who—it was highly skilled and very sharp knives in the dark 

areas. They were paid well and they were highly skilled. I couldn’t 

walk in and do that, I will tell you. 

And so I think we need to put that on the table that these are 

hard jobs but they are in many cases skilled jobs. And they are 

often in remote locations. So when I went out and visited the 

strawberry growers—I don’t have any in my district, but over on 

the coast, I mean people are living in barracks and it is not like 

you could live at home or anywhere nearby. I mean, it is in a remote location. So I think in addition to the wages, there are other 

elements of this profession that really weigh against people in 

urban settings saying, you know, I will go sign up and do that. 

Having said that, I think the wages do matter. We have talked 

about 50 percent to 75 percent of the farm workers in America 

don’t have their proper papers. But that means that 50 percent to 

a quarter percent are Americans and they deserve the same kind 

of wage protection that any other American worker has. 

I was kind of surprised that apparently the Bush administration 

at the end put out their regulation that lowered the wages, and the 

assertion seemed to be that somehow this would protect U.S. workers from wage competition from undocumented workers. But that 

didn’t make any sense to me. At the time, Congressman George 

Miller and I wrote a letter noting that wage competition for Americans is just as bad from temporary workers as it is from undocumented workers and that lowering the wages would bring about exactly what the Department of Labor said it was trying to prevent. 

What do you think of that rationale, that by lowering the wages 

for temporary workers, we could somehow protect the wages of 

American workers? Does that make sense to you? 

Ms. OATES. Congresswoman, there is absolutely no other area, no 

other sector that we have ever done that and seen it not have an 

impact. So I am confused by that. 

But, you know, I can’t tell you what the thinking was, and I have 

to respect my colleagues from the last Administration. 

Ms. LOFGREN. That is fair. 

49 

Ms. OATES. What I can tell you is that when we made the 

change, we did it at the beginning of our Administration so that 

we could learn by our mistakes and make adjustments and we 

have done that. As I said in my oral testimony, we have had challenges and we have adapted to those challenges. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Well, under the H-2A program, workers can’t 

switch employers, and they have to leave the United States when 

the job ends. And if they want to return in the following year, they 

have to depend on an employer to apply for a visa for them, and 

of course, they have no rights to transition to any kind of permanent protected status. 

Given that, is the Department concerned that H-2A workers 

might be particularly vulnerable to abuse and limited in their ability to ask for better job terms because of the bargaining position 

they have, the way that we have set this up? What do you think 

about that? 

Ms. OATES. Absolutely, Congresswoman. I mean, it is why getting information from them is so difficult. In many instances, they 

are loyal to their employer and things work well, but in the instances when they have problems, it is very difficult—and I am 

sure you will hear that from the advocate groups—to get them to 

say anything because their family’s livelihood is dependent on their 

ability to work for the full crop cycle. 

Ms. LOFGREN. So given that this group—and that is not to say 

that every employer would exploit or abuse them. I am not certainly saying that. But as a group, they are particularly vulnerable 

to abuse and they are in no position to argue about it. Would that 

cause you concern that unscrupulous employers—not the bulk, but 

unscrupulous employers—would discriminate against American 

workers to obtain a group that they could exploit? 

Ms. OATES. Well, I think that is exactly the reason that we think 

it is so important to have the State workforce agency involved. We 

think the States are in a unique position. They know the employers. They know employers that have played by the rules before. 

And actually many Governors have spoken to me about the fact 

that those that played by the rules often felt disadvantaged by the 

folks that you are defining as unscrupulous employers. So I think 

it is our statutory responsibility to make sure that we are doing all 

that we can to make sure that more employers are playing by the 

rules. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The time of the—— 

Ms. LOFGREN. In closing, if I may ask unanimous consent for another 60 seconds. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Without objection. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I would just note—I think it was last week—we 

had the former Chairman of the Committee, Bruce Morrison, saying we ought to trust the market rather than the regulations. And 

if we gave some stature to these employees so that they were not 

in a position to be abused, that is likelier to protect them than an 

army of enforcers. You will never have enough enforcers out in the 

field to protect against that. Isn’t that correct? 

Ms. OATES. That is exactly right. I mean, our average over the 

past few years in terms of Wage and Hour, as I said, our enforcement arm, is about 131 investigations a year. 

50 

Ms. LOFGREN. I thank the Chairman for the additional time and 

yield back. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The gentleman from Iowa, the Vice-Chair of the 

Subcommittee, Mr. King. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I appreciate your testimony, Ms. Oates. 

And I think about some of the things that were said. First, I look 

forward to the apology that I expect will be coming from Mr. Conyers, and I don’t feel the need to defend myself. I will let the facts 

unfold here over time. 

But also, on the statement made by the Chairman of the Subcommittee, ‘‘we are a country of immigrants,’’ I would make the 

point that every nation is a nation a immigrants. I haven’t found 

anyone who came up with an exception to that, although some 

have tried. 

I would take you to this. You are the Department of Labor. So 

do you look at the big picture items such as our population is somewhere around 306 million to 308 million people? Do you know what 

our labor force is, the overall labor force? 

Ms. OATES. In all sectors? 

Mr. KING. Yes. 

Ms. OATES. I don’t have that number with me, Congressman, but 

I am happy to get that for you. 

Mr. KING. Well, I would appreciate that. I know that there is a 

chart that is published on your website that is very available. The 

last time I looked at it, it was about 142 million. 

Ms. OATES. I would have said a little under 150 million. So I 

think that is probably right, but I would rather give you an accurate number. 

Mr. KING. And I am confident that 142 million has gone up some. 

So let’s say we are in conceptual agreement here. 

Do you ever look at those numbers then at the number of Americans that are not in the labor force? And do you happen to have 

a conceptual estimate of what that might be that we would find if 

we looked on that chart? I am waiting for it to come to me. 

Ms. OATES. No, no. Absolutely. I think that the number is growing, unfortunately, separating from the labor force, people getting 

fatigued from looking after being dislocated. And the critical number that I would point out to you is the abysmal participation of 

those 25 and younger right now who are actively looking for jobs, 

and that is particularly marked when you are talking about 

disaggregating by people of color. In your State, both Black and 

Latinos in Iowa are twice as likely to be unemployed 25 and under 

than—— 

Mr. KING. I appreciate your perspective on that, and that is 

something I wanted to explore here. From some old numbers, mostly from memory for me, I remember going to that chart and adding 

up. Would you agree that 16 is a legitimate age to start counting 

the available labor force? 

Ms. OATES. Yes, sir. 

Mr. KING. So from 16 to 19, if I remember, the last time I looked 

it was 9.7 million in that group. And then from 20 to 25, I believe 

is the next segment. There was another group, a little larger than 

51 

half that size. And as I added that up, I went up to 74 because 

Walmart hires at 74 and we are paying unemployment at 74. 

Now, I am making this point because I think we will find, when 

we look at this chart, that those not in the workforce, those who 

are formally unemployed and those who are not in the workforce 

but not formally unemployed, come to a number that will approach 

or perhaps exceed 80 million. And if we have 80 million Americans 

that are eligible for work—now, all of them are not eligible perhaps 

for picking strawberries, but this is a huge universe of people. 80 

million people. That is a greater population than most countries in 

the world by far. 

So I want to make this point also that there are at least 71 

means-tested Federal welfare programs that we have in this country that compete for a large share of that labor that is not in the 

workforce. And so when we look at an equation and hear a statement that there are a million illegals working in the farm sector 

and we need them, I am thinking about a nation that has a lot of 

people that are riding along on this boat and not pulling on the 

oars. Wouldn’t a logical nation want to employ all of those that are 

eligible for work before they would bring people in, especially given 

that we have 71 means-tested welfare programs and we have established a welfare state and that welfare state supplements low 

wages also in the United States? 

And when you consider that the lowest 50 percent of income pays 

only 2.7 percent of the income tax, would you agree that there are 

many things out of balance in this economy and that it would be 

probably difficult to try to fix it by going in and adjusting to the 

demand in the H-2A program? 

Ms. OATES. Well, I don’t represent an agency that operates any 

of those 71 means-tested welfare programs, so I don’t think I can 

speak on their behalf. 

But let me tell you what I can speak about. I think it is critical 

that we don’t make inside-the-beltway decisions about what American workers will and won’t do. I think we need to make sure that 

American workers are aware of the work that is available near to 

their home or near to a place where they are able to go to work. 

And I think anecdotally in the summer of 2010, we saw community college students and high school graduates picking fruit that 

never dreamed they would be picking it before. 

And I think that our responsibility statutorily is to do everything 

in our power to make sure that Americans are aware of jobs that 

are available and that the guest workers that we bring over come 

over in a fair and equitable way and that no worker working in the 

agricultural business adversely affects the wages of American 

workers. 

So I mean, I would be happy to look at numbers with you. I 

would also be happy to look at any mechanism you or any other 

Members of the Committee would have to help us get the word out. 

Mr. KING. Mr. Chairman, I would ask unanimous consent for an 

additional minute. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Without objection. 

Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I would just pose this question. There are over 600,000 acres in 

the San Joaquin Valley that have been dried up because of water 

52 

policy primarily coming out of California but also that this Congress has some oversight over. Wouldn’t it be rational to think that 

there would be a demand for fewer Ag workers in the San Joaquin 

Valley if we can’t get the water opened up to the farmers down 

there? 

Ms. OATES. Again, it is not an area of my expertise with the San 

Joaquin Valley, but it would seem to me that we should be doing 

everything as a Federal Government that we can to open up employment opportunities in every sector, and if clearing arid land 

and making it farmland again is a way to create jobs and create 

businesses, we should be actively looking at that. 

Mr. KING. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

Mr. Conyers? 

Mr. CONYERS. I don’t have any questions. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Mr. Conyers has no questions. 

We would yield then to the gentleman from Texas, Mr. 

Gohmert—Mr. Poe. I am sorry. Mr. Lungren is next. If Mr. Lungren will join us, he will be next. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Ms. Oates, I just have to say that I am as disappointed by your testimony as just about anything I have ever 

heard. This is as nonresponsive as Steve Colbert last year. 

Ms. OATES. I am sorry to hear that, sir. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Well, I am very sorry to hear it too because listening to your testimony and reading your testimony, you would think 

that the H-2A program is working well. It is a failure right now 

for agriculture, and those of us in this Congress on the Democrat 

and Republican side are going to pass e-Verify. I don’t think there 

is too much doubt about that. And when we pass e-Verify, we are 

going to have a crisis in the agricultural area, and we need to have 

something that works. And I hear from you about you don’t have 

an opinion as to why only 50,000-some people have made applications when there seems to be a demonstrated need for 200,000. You 

don’t have an opinion on that? I mean, you are open to opinions, 

but you evidently weren’t open to the opinions of the previous Administration when they attempted to make it work. 

We have a crisis and some people are talking about the fact that 

California is the reason we don’t have water. The reason we don’t 

have water is a Federal court decision based on Federal law that 

says that the delta smelt is more important than homo sapiens in 

the central valley of California who don’t have jobs. And we have 

hundreds of thousands of acres now fallow. We are going to have 

millions of acres fallow if we don’t do something to solve this problem. 

To hear somebody come up here and testify as to how well the 

H-2A program is working when it is a demonstrated failure right 

now for agriculture—we are going to have a crisis and you are telling us that you are concerned about your statutory authority after 

you folks decided that you would get rid of the regulations of the 

previous Administration, but you are open to other opinions. I 

mean, frankly, I am very, very frustrated because I know what is 

going to happen. We are going to have a crisis in agriculture in the 

United States. A lot of it is going to be in California, but not just 

53 

California. And we are going to be sitting here talking about how 

well the H-2A program has worked, and it isn’t working. I am astounded. 

The fact of the matter is we have had foreign labor working in 

agriculture for 150 years. It has been legal or illegal, depending on 

whether we had a workable program. And I am not going to defend 

the Bracero program because I think it had all sorts of problems 

with it. I have tried to come up with alternatives. But the fact of 

the matter is it is frustrating. 

In 1986, I was the Republican who led the charge for the votes 

to pass Simpson-Mazzoli, and what happened was what someone 

else mentioned here. A lot of those people who were legalized went 

on to other work. They didn’t stay in the fields. I am not saying 

they should have stayed in the fields. I wouldn’t have stayed in the 

fields either. The fact of the matter is it is tough work, as you have 

said. And I don’t think we can get American workers to work there. 

I wish we could. And if that is not the case, we need to have a 

workable program. 

The H-2A program is not working, demonstrably not working. 

And to have you come up here and testify as if the thing is just 

working fine, I am sorry, is extremely disappointing because some 

of us are trying to work our way out of it. Some would like to have 

comprehensive immigration reform. We are not going to have it. 

Let’s just be honest about it. We are going to have e-Verify I think, 

and if we do, e-Verify and no comprehensive program, agriculture 

is going to be clobbered, and maybe some people think they ought 

to be clobbered. They are being clobbered by the lack of water right 

now and no one seems to give a whole lot about that. 

But I am sorry. I am just very, very frustrated. 

Let me ask you this question. If we pass e-Verify, do you have 

an opinion as to whether that will have any impact in the agricultural labor market? 

Ms. OATES. Congressman, if the Congress passes e-Verify, we 

will do everything that we can to work with—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. That is not my question. My question is do you 

think it will have an impact in terms of the labor market in agriculture in the United States. 

Ms. OATES. If the NAWS data is correct, as we believe it is, absolutely it will have an effect. 

Mr. LUNGREN. And what recourse will agricultural workers have? 

Advertise for American workers to work in agriculture? Will that 

solve their problem in your opinion? 

Ms. OATES. In my opinion, it is a part of the solution but not the 

entire solution. 

And Congressman, if I may, with great respect, just correct 

something. I never said that the H-2A program is working well. I 

told you what we were doing. 

Mr. LUNGREN. I am sorry. I guess I misinterpreted the words 

when you were talking about the great job that the Department of 

Labor is doing. 

Ms. OATES. I respect that. But you need to hear what I did say. 

What I did say is we are working very hard to make sure that the 

information gets out and that we are in the process of continuous—— 

54 

Mr. LUNGREN. Do you think it is going to work? If you get 

enough information out, are we going to have enough American 

workers to fill the void of those foreign workers who will now not 

be eligible under e-Verify? 

Ms. OATES. I don’t know the answer to that, but I will tell you 

we—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. Do you have a suspicion? Do you have a suspicion? Do you have an inkling? 

Ms. OATES. I am not a suspicious person. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Do you have an inkling? 

Ms. OATES. I have an inkling that we would have to ramp up 

what we are doing to address increased claims and we would be 

willing to do that. 

Mr. LUNGREN. I thank you very much for your candor. 

Ms. OATES. Thank you, Congressman. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

The gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson Lee. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Ms. Oates, welcome? 

Ms. OATES. Thank you, Congresswoman. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And thank the Secretary and the Department 

for doing such great work on behalf of American workers. 

You know that our chief responsibility for all of us and I believe 

the crux of the Department of Labor’s founding premise is to protect American workers, protect workers. 

Ms. OATES. That is correct. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And as well, I believe it is to be part of the 

nucleus of job creation and generation that we are trying to and 

that we have been successful on for many of us with the policies 

that we have worked on here in this Congress. It has been about 

investing in job creation. And a lot of what you do is based upon 

that. Am I correct? 

Ms. OATES. That is correct. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. So it is interesting on this particular hearing 

on the H-2A program—and I was reading materials, and it looks 

as if we are conflicted on the potential of this program. What is the 

jurisdiction that the Department of Labor has with respect to farm 

workers? 

Ms. OATES. Congresswoman, it is our responsibility at the Employment and Training Administration to work with the employers 

to take the applications, to work with the States in taking those 

applications, and then it is our sister agency, Wage and Hour’s responsibility at the Department of Labor to do the enforcement. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. So do you think it is productive to suggest 

that the wages of farm workers, as you have stated them, over the 

maybe period that you have been in place to be lowered? Do you 

have any documentation that suggests that these are outrageous 

hourly rates and that you are creating multi-millionaires in the 

farm working business? 

Ms. OATES. I do not, and I think it is really important. Unlike 

many other sectoral workers in the United States, farm workers 

don’t enjoy the privilege of overtime. So, therefore, their hourly 

wage is what they get whether they work 8 hours a day or 16 

hours a day. And I think their work ethic is such that in partnerVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:05 Jun 29, 2011 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00058 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\041311\65744.000 HJUD1 PsN: 65744
55 

ship with the employer, they often do work extended hours because 

of mother nature and the crop times. So I think that it would be 

very difficult to become a wealthy person as a farm worker. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Though this is not something we are promoting, I know I have heard from adults who have said they started as they were children, and in fact, we do know that in a number 

of farming communities, there is an issue of when the child will go 

to school and taking children out of school. So we know that they 

are working during that timeframe. We know that they are working as young adults during the time that women are in their childbearing stages, and some may even be working during pregnancy. 

We know that there are those who might be considered senior who 

are working. And the work—is it light labor in your interpretation? 

Ms. OATES. As I shared with my personal experience, I couldn’t 

do it for 2 hours. I think it is absolutely difficult labor particularly 

with those crops that are picked in the high-point heats of the summer and late fall. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I know as a Members of this Committee for 

a number of years, one of the things that we talked about is the 

poor living conditions that farm workers are in. Have you assessed 

that in the U.S. Department of Labor? 

Ms. OATES. It was something that there was a fair amount of 

time and energy spent on as we contemplated changing the rule because the self-attestation on housing clearly was not meeting a livable standard. That was part of the anecdotal evidence that was 

brought to us and we investigated, that housing was one of the serious problems under self-attestation. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. So the whole question of living conditions and 

travel, the idea of lowering wages and then having the workers be 

responsible for their travel and then poor working conditions might 

make this a very challenging work to be involved in. 

Ms. OATES. Absolutely. And one of the things that is out of all 

our control, except our friends at the Department State, who is another valued partner in this, is the abysmal behavior of some of the 

agents in foreign countries, what they charge people even to get on 

a list. So we need to make sure that we are being as clear and 

transparent as possible here in the United States on our part because we really don’t have the same degree of control over those 

unscrupulous agents in other countries. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. So let’s get to the crux of this. How many 

American workers do you believe are being blocked from participating in farm work, and is there a complexity and a seemingly 

contradiction in the call for more farm workers and then the call 

that immigrants, because these happen to be immigrants, are taking jobs away from American workers? Is there a way that the Department of Labor can assist in getting American workers into the 

farm industry? 

Ms. OATES. Well, I think what we are trying to do, what we 

started last year, and what we are amplifying this year is, in our 

close partnership with States, to get clear information out about 

the work that is available, about the hourly wages that are available, and the earning potentials, particularly for young people who 

may be willing to do this to help pay their way through college and 

56 

for those who have experienced no luck in looking for jobs after 

their last unemployment status ran out. 

So with the States, different States are doing different things. 

Actually the Texas Workforce Board in your State has been very 

aggressive working with us, even though Texas is not suffering to 

the great extent as some other States. Their unemployment is 

somewhere around the middle 8’s right now, 8.5. They have done 

much better in the recovery earlier. But the Texas Workforce Commission has been a great partner in terms of getting that information—— 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. So our U.S. Department of Labor is making 

themselves available with information for American workers. 

Ms. OATES. That is exactly right. 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. And when we hear the cry for more workers, 

it is not because we have not let American workers be aware of 

their opportunities, and it is the farm industry that has cried out 

for more immigrant workers to be able to ensure that their crops 

go from farm to market. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The time of the gentlelady has expired. 

Mr. Gowdy from South Carolina? 

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I hope we can talk 

about comprehensive immigration reform. Thank you. 

Mr. GOWDY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Ms. Oates, let me apologize to you. One of the frustrations of 

being in Congress is there are multiple hearings at the same time, 

and I have been in a markup in OGR. But I wanted to come over 

because nary a week has gone by that farmers from South Carolina 

have not come into my office and expressed to me their frustration 

with trying to abide by our laws and also make a living at the 

same time. So my questions to you hopefully will capture some of 

their frustration and enable me to go back and provide them with 

some answers. 

Since the creation of the department’s online job registry that 

lists job opportunities with growers who have applied for H-2A 

workers, how many American workers have received jobs through 

the registry? 

Ms. OATES. I don’t have that information, and I don’t think we 

collect that information. So we list the jobs just like we would do 

on a job board for any sector, and as people go and fill that job, 

all we know is that the job has been removed. We don’t know 

whether a worker from Texas took it or a worker from South Carolina. Just like we wouldn’t know whether the job order was filled 

and removed, we wouldn’t know who took that job. 

Mr. GOWDY. Can you cite me to any studies, or do you have evidence other than anecdotal evidence that the H-2A program is costing American workers jobs, that there is a pool of American workers who would take these jobs absent the program? Is there a study 

you can cite me to or something to support that proposition? 

Ms. OATES. No, Congressman, unfortunately not, but it would be 

no different. I don’t know your district, but I can tell you South 

Carolina—we had an Ohio metalworking company move to South 

Carolina, and they called us and said we can’t find workers. And 

what we did for them was the same thing we would do for any of 

your folks, is get them connected with the State and get them conVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:05 Jun 29, 2011 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00060 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\041311\65744.000 HJUD1 PsN: 65744
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nected with the local workforce board. And I am happy to tell you 

that within 8 weeks they had a full workforce. So I only give you 

that anecdotal outside of the agricultural work because it is a recent example in your State. What we are doing is advertising those 

jobs, hoping that that will get the word out through a number of 

means, and then maybe this time next year I will have a better answer for you. 

But right now, I know of no study and I have no hard data that 

explicitly says 10 American workers took a job and removed the 

need for 10 guest workers to come in and take those jobs. 

Mr. GOWDY. Are there any requirements that putative employers 

are not allowed to pursue? Here is the scenario. I want to apply 

for an H-2A visa, and I have got American workers that may apply 

in that slot. Can I run a background check on American workers 

before I hire them in lieu of my H-2A visa? 

Ms. OATES. You, as an employer, can put any bells and whistles 

on getting that job that you would like. Background checks would 

be included in what I would put under the category of bells and 

whistles. 

Mr. GOWDY. So if folks in the agricultural field are under the 

misapprehension that they cannot run background checks on American workers who want to apply, then you and I together today can 

correct that misapprehension. 

Ms. OATES. So let me be very explicit about this. I apply for a 

job, any job. The employer has any right to tell me what they are 

going to do, drug test me, do a background check or anything else, 

as long as I know that, as I continue the application. 

Where there could be a problem—and I would want to get back 

to you on this, if you chose to do a background check on me and 

didn’t notify me. When I took my job in the U.S. Senate, they notified me that I was going to have a background check. When I was 

nominated by the President, they notified me that there was going 

to be a background check. There might be something different if 

you did that background check without my knowledge. 

But I would love to get you that information. Again, I am not an 

enforcement agency. So I am not as familiar with these details as 

some of my other assistant secretaries might be. So I would love 

to keep the door open so that I could get you more accurate information on that from our attorneys and the people in the enforcement agencies. 

Mr. GOWDY. I would like that because I want to be able to tell 

the folks in the agricultural business in the upstate of South Carolina what they—I mean, this is a category of folks who very much 

want to comply with the law. To the extent that they can figure 

out what it is, they want to. And if they are operating under the 

misapprehension that they are not allowed to screen workers because they have applied for an H-2A visa, I would like to disabuse 

them of that misapprehension with your help. 

Ms. OATES. Absolutely. I don’t know whether this would ruin 

your reputation or not, but we would be happy—— 

Mr. GOWDY. You couldn’t do nothing to ruin my reputation that 

I have not already done. 

Ms. OATES [continuing]. To join those meetings or happy to meet 

with your constituents and your staff. 

58 

Mr. GOWDY. That would be very helpful. 

Ms. OATES. You know, we are your Department of Labor. 

Mr. GOWDY. That would be very helpful to me. 

When I graduated law school, I ruined my reputation. So there 

is nothing you can do. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. GOWDY. Last question. And again, this is born out of their 

frustration. I am nothing but the conduit to ask you, and if you are 

not the proper person for me to ask, then tell me. And I acknowledge that you are not in charge of the Wage and Hour Division. 

Ms. OATES. The Assistant Secretary is much taller and much 

younger. 

Mr. GOWDY. There is a sense of frustration or there is an allegation, shall we say—and bald allegations don’t carry any weight 

with me, but I am going to pass it on in case you can’t knock it 

back—that Wage and Hour investigators hand out lower penalties 

to H-2A growers who publicly support the AgJOBS amnesty; in 

other words, that there is a disparity in the punishment based on 

your support or lack thereof for certain programs. Have you seen 

any evidence of that at all? 

Ms. OATES. I haven’t, Congressman, but I might not. So that 

doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist. If you would allow me to get 

back to you. I do have a staff person here from Wage and Hour who 

will take your question back and we will get you an answer 

through the Chair with your permission or individually, whatever 

you would prefer. I haven’t worked with this Committee before. But 

whatever way you would like us to get that information, Chairman, 

we would be happy to do it. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. That is totally appropriate and we always summarize the request for that at the end of the hearing. 

The time of the gentleman has expired. 

Mr. GOWDY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. I have no further questions for the witness. Ms. 

Oates, thank you for being here. 

At this time we will bring up the second panel. 

Ms. OATES. Thank you, Chairman, very much. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Our three panelists today on panel II starts with 

Mr. Leon Sequeira who is of counsel for the Washington, D.C. office 

of Seyfarth Shaw LLP. He is former Assistant Secretary of Labor 

during the George W. Bush administration. Mr. Sequeira has a 

background in business-related immigration matters and was involved in the Department of Labor’s 2008 revisions to the H-2A 

and H-2B temporary worker program regulations. 

Prior to his service at the Department of Labor, Mr. Sequeira 

worked in the U.S. Senate where he served as legal counsel to now 

Republican Leader Mitch McConnell. 

Mr. Sequeira received his B.A. from Northwest Missouri State 

University and a J.D. with honors from George Washington University Law School. 

The second witness is Mr. Lee Wicker. Mr. Wicker is Deputy Director of the North Carolina Growers Association, the largest H-2A 

program user in the Nation. 

Prior to this position, he worked for the North Carolina Employment Security Commission as the technical supervisor for farm emVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:05 Jun 29, 2011 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00062 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\041311\65744.000 HJUD1 PsN: 65744
59 

ployment programs and the statewide administrator for the H-2A 

program. 

Mr. Wicker has been growing flue-cured tobacco with his family 

in Lee County, North Carolina since 1978. 

He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel 

Hill. 

And our third witness, Mr. Bruce Goldstein, is President of 

Farmworker Justice here in Washington, D.C. He has substantial 

experience regarding the H-2A temporary foreign agricultural 

worker program. 

Prior, he worked as a labor and civil rights lawyer in southern 

Illinois and became a staff attorney at Farmworker Justice in 1988. 

He received his bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and his 

law degree from Washington University in St. Louis. 

We will start with Mr. Sequeira. And am I pronouncing that correctly? Close enough? 

Mr. SEQUEIRA. Sure. Sequeira. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Thank you. 

TESTIMONY OF LEON R. SEQUEIRA, OF COUNSEL, 

SEYFARTH SHAW LLP 

Mr. SEQUEIRA. Good morning, Chairman Gallegly, Ranking Member Lofgren, and Members of the Committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify at today’s hearing. 

Nearly 4 years ago to the day, I appeared before this Subcommittee as an Assistant Secretary of Labor to discuss the importance of legal immigration to our Nation’s economy. Today, however, I appear before the Subcommittee in my personal capacity to 

discuss whether the H-2A temporary non-immigrant worker program is meeting the needs of American agriculture. And Mr. Chairman, I would submit the answer to that question is no. 

Since the Department of Labor issued new H-2A regulations last 

year, American farmers with the need for seasonal labor to help 

plant, tend, and harvest their crops find themselves frequently 

trapped in a dysfunctional Department of Labor bureaucracy that 

is either unable or unwilling to make coherent decisions in a timely 

manner. This is not what Congress had in mind when it created 

the H-2A program 25 years ago. 

When establishing the program, Congress understood that the 

timing of a farmer’s labor needs is dictated by the weather, not by 

the arbitrary whims of some Government bureaucracy in a faraway 

city. For that reason, Congress established precise deadlines by 

which the Department of Labor has to act on H-2A applications. 

But on a near daily basis, we now see the Department ignores this 

clear congressional intent, not to mention the clear and explicit 

statutory language. 

The Department’s mission in administering the H-2A program is 

to provide farmers with timely access to labor and to review their 

applications to ensure that agricultural workers are being properly 

recruited and paid so that the employment of these foreign temporary workers does not result in an adverse effect on U.S. workers. That mission, however, is being perverted by arbitrary administrative practices that routinely impose substantial delays and 

added costs on employers while delivering few, if any, measurable 

60 

benefits. Rather than helping facilitate timely access to seasonal 

labor, the Department instead subjects farmers’ applications to 

multiple rounds of nitpicking over minor, nonsubstantive paperwork issues and typographical errors that have nothing to do with 

ensuring U.S. workers are properly recruited and paid for these 

jobs. 

The examples of the questionable behavior by the Department 

are virtually endless. To cite just a few recent examples, the Department frequently imposes requirements on farmers that appear 

nowhere in the statute or the regulations. In countless cases, the 

Department rejects applications without any legitimate reason 

whatsoever. Numerous farmers see their applications delayed as a 

result of State and Federal bureaucratic in-fighting. Still others 

have their paperwork accepted at the State level as meeting all the 

H-2A program requirements, only to have the Federal Department 

of Labor reject the same paperwork saying it does not meet the 

program requirements. Other employers have their paperwork accepted by the Department of Labor but then a month later, the Department will change its mind, send them a letter, and claim the 

application doesn’t meet the standards for acceptance after all. 

When subjected to this arbitrary decision-making, H-2A employers, who by definition have a pressing need for workers, are left 

with few options but to submit to the Department’s unreasonable 

demands if they are to have any hope at all of securing workers 

in a somewhat timely fashion. 

But increasingly, employers are pushing back at this bureaucratic bullying. The Department’s questionable approach to the H2A program has led to a recent explosion of litigation both before 

administrative law judges and in Federal court. Notably in the past 

6 months, there have been more than 300 administrative appeals 

filed with the Department of Labor’s administrative law judges 

challenging the Department’s decisions. That is more than twice 

the number of appeals filed during the same period the year before. 

The results of these appeals demonstrate the Department’s decisions overwhelmingly fail to withstand scrutiny. In the hundreds of 

appeals in the past 6 months, the Department’s position has prevailed less than 10 percent of the time. That loss record speaks volumes. Out of every 10 tries, the Department gets it right just once. 

Unfortunately for employers, the appeals process is becoming yet 

one more required step in a long application process because the 

Department routinely refuses to correct its own erroneous actions. 

A recent decision issued by an administrative law judge in an H2A appeal summed up the issue very well. The judge implored the 

Department to review its policy and consider the costs it imposes 

on employers, the administrative law judges, and the taxpayers. 

The judge also noted that forcing employers to file these appeals 

was, quote, a patently inefficient and unnecessarily expensive way 

to proceed and that it seems to reflect a breakdown in common 

sense. Mr. Chairman, I could not say it better myself. 

And I will close by noting that since the judge issued that opinion in February, American farmers have been forced to file more 

than 100 additional appeals of the Department’s decisions. 

Thank you. I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Sequeira follows:] 

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Mr. GALLEGLY. Thank you very much. 

Mr. Wicker? 

TESTIMONY OF H. LEE WICKER, DEPUTY DIRECTOR, 

NORTH CAROLINA GROWERS ASSOCIATION 

Mr. WICKER. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, and Committee 

Members. I am Lee Wicker, Deputy Director of the North Carolina 

Growers Association. Thank you for holding this hearing on a critical issue for labor-intensive agriculture. 

As the largest H-2A program user in the Nation, NCGA currently has 600 grower members that will employ nearly 6,000 H2A workers and many thousands more U.S. workers this season. I 

am extremely proud of the growers I represent because they are 

the most compliant farmers in the Nation when it comes to the various State and Federal labor laws. 

Without farm workers, crops rot in the fields, farmers will lose 

their farms, and grocery store shelves across America will be void 

of fresh local produce. It is that simple. We must never take farmers, farm workers or our food supply for granted. If farms don’t 

have farm workers, then our food supply is in jeopardy. 

Farmers need a legal, available, affordable workforce, and the H2A program has the potential to fill that need. Presently H-2A is 

the only option for farmers if they want to ensure they employ a 

legal workforce. Unfortunately, the H-2A process is not working 

well because it is costly, time-consuming, and flawed. Farmers 

have to complete a lengthy labor certification process that is slow, 

bureaucratic, and frustrating. In addition, they are forced to pay an 

artificially inflated adverse effect wage rate. Many producers simply have no confidence that they can successfully navigate, afford, 

or comply with the onerous requirements. 

The H-2A rules that were written in 1987 were in desperate need 

of reform because the program had become too expensive and bureaucratic for farmers to use. In 2008, new rules were written by 

Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao. These regulations were a mixed 

bag, but on balance, the 2008 regulations made real improvements 

to important areas and more new growers signed up to use the program. 

But in 2010 the H-2A rules were rewritten by current Secretary 

Solis who took the worst from the ’87 rules, combined with the bad 

from the 2008 rules, maintained harsh penalties, added unnecessary barriers and unwarranted burdens, and created the current 

regulations which are horrendous for farmers, making the program 

harder than ever to use. 

Currently H-2A is too litigious, too expensive, and too much of 

a bureaucratic morass at three Federal agencies that oversee the 

program. Since the Solis regulations took effect, the number of 

North Carolina farmers using the program has declined. Those 

farmers haven’t stopped farming. They have merely switched to illegal workers, which the current Administration hopes to build 

pressure and increase the chances of success for amnesty bills like 

AgJOBS. 

Farmers need workers not amnesty to grow crops. To ensure that 

growers have an adequate and legal workforce, the solution is not 

amnesty bills like AgJOBS but rather permanent statutory reform 

67 

of the broken H-2A program so that farmers can and will use it. 

Farmers want to comply with the law, but to do so, the program 

must be viable, sustainable, and predictable. 

Having endured the regulatory exercise twice in 24 months demonstrates clearly that improvements to the H-2A program must be 

put into statute to avoid the regulatory whipsawing of the regulated community where farmers lose confidence in the program 

when Administrations, agendas, and priorities change. 

In order to fix the H-2A program so that it is workable, there are 

four crucial areas of the program that must be corrected in statute. 

Number one, reform the wage rate. Link it to a statutory minimum wage, State or Federal, whichever is higher in each State. 

An H-2A wage rate of 110 percent of minimum wage is a fair rate 

that will prevent an adverse effect on U.S. farm workers. While 

farmers would use piece rates to create incentive, the 110 percent 

would be the absolute minimum. It is important to remember that 

H-2A workers get free housing, utilities, and transportation each 

day to the job, all provided by the farmer. If you add the costs to 

obtain H-2A workers using the economic model developed in 2006 

by Phillips and Brown, Ag economists at NC State, the expense 

equals on average an additional $2.06 per hour. This is a conservative estimate. 

Number two, mandate binding mediation and arbitration. Growers and workers should quickly resolve legal issues through mediation and arbitration. Growers sign contracts all the time that contain this kind of language. And so if it is okay for farmers, then 

it should be okay for farm workers. 

Number three, visa cost and transportation reimbursement. Cost 

associated with the worker applying for the visa should be borne 

by the worker. Inbound transportation should be reimbursed to the 

worker by the farmer, as it currently is, upon completion of 50 percent of the work contract. If the reimbursement is issued upon arrival, the financial incentive for the worker to remain on the farm 

is reduced, and workers who quit leave the farmer shorthanded. 

Number four, streamline the H-2A process. There are too many 

unnecessary delays at Labor, Homeland Security, and State. The 

entire system must be streamlined and simplified. Farmers want 

statutory language that describes in detail the labor market test/ 

certification criteria to avoid the regulatory whipsawing with executive branch changes. We have learned this the hard way that 

when the language is ambiguous, administrators and courts with 

an agenda or bias can interpret legislation in ways that Congress 

never intended. 

We would also like to see the definition of ‘‘agriculture’’ expanded 

to allow greater participation from farmers with an 11-month 

standard visa rather than 10 and a 3-year special visa which would 

allow certain sectors of agriculture and year-round farms to continue to thrive. 

In summary, without these changes, H-2A is simply too expensive, too litigious, and too onerous for most growers to use. Most 

farmers prefer to employ illegal aliens because it is cheaper and 

they remain off the Federal and legal radar screens. Even high profile farmers employ illegal workers with impunity because they 

68 

have allegedly been told by ICE agents that they won’t be investigated. 

As Members of the House Judiciary Immigration Policy and Enforcement Subcommittee, you have the forum and the ability to articulate the problem and offer policy solutions that will ensure 

American agriculture has an adequate and legal labor force. 

The H-2A program is not and never has been about immigration. 

H-2A reform should be decoupled from the comprehensive immigration reform debate. Please remember our growers need a workable 

H-2A program, not amnesty. Amnesty didn’t work in ’86 and socalled comprehensive immigration reform bills like AgJOBS with 

its amnesty provisions will not work today. It will only make matters worse. 

Thank you for your attention, and I look forward to answering 

any questions you have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Wicker follows:] 

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Mr. GALLEGLY. Thank you, Mr. Wicker. 

Mr. Goldstein? 


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TESTIMONY OF BRUCE GOLDSTEIN, PRESIDENT, 

FARMWORKER JUSTICE 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Mr. Chairman and Members, thank you for the 

opportunity to testify about the H-2A agricultural guest worker 

program and farm workers, the poorest of the working poor. But 

it is good to hear, Mr. Chairman, that some far workers are making $28 per hour in California. 

The H-2A program is deeply flawed and should not be the major 

vehicle for filling the Nation’s 2 million to 2.5 million jobs on farms 

and ranches. 

In addition, Congress should not get mired in previously fought 

battles. Many agribusiness groups lobbied in the 1990’s for changes 

to streamline the H-2A program by cutting worker protections and 

reducing Government oversight. These legislative efforts failed as 

did efforts of farm worker advocates to pass their own policy proposals. 

Recognizing the need for a solution, major grower and farm 

worker groups reached a compromise called AgJOBS. It would 

allow eligible undocumented farm workers to earn a legal immigration status, revise the H-2A program in balanced ways, and provide 

America with a stable, productive, and decently treated farm labor 

force. 

The Bush administration in its last few days made drastic antiworker changes to the H-2A program regulations, slashing wage 

rates and job protections for U.S. and foreign workers. Fortunately, 

Secretary Solis reversed these changes, mostly restoring the 

Reagan regulations’ modest wages and labor protections. The Department also instituted additional common sense protections such 

as a surety bond requirement for labor contractors and a requirement to disclose job terms to workers by the time of their visa application. 

Deporting the large number of undocumented farm workers in 

this country is not feasible. It would bring chaos to agriculture and 

would be a vast waste of taxpayers’ money. Undocumented workers 

constitute 52 percent to 70 percent of the farm labor force. 

Moreover, the H-2A program, which presently provides 3 to 5 

percent of the farm labor force, cannot be a meaningful solution for 

meeting the bulk of agriculture’s labor needs. The H-2A program 

cannot be expanded rapidly enough to replace the current unauthorized work force. 

Moreover, the H-2A program should not be the model for the 

farm labor force. Pervasive abuses have characterized the H-2A 

program decades in part because it is inherently flawed. The worker is tied to a single employer. The employer holds the power to 

decide whether workers can come to the United States and whether 

they can return in the future. In fear of deportation or not being 

called back in the following year, workers are extremely reluctant 

to challenge unfair treatment. 

Many guest workers also fear seeking better treatment because 

they borrow large sums to pay recruiters for the opportunity to 

work and for their travel costs. If they lose their job, they cannot 

repay their loans. 

While a small number of H-2A workers have rights under collective bargaining agreements, the vast majority have no union, and 

76 

with legal aid programs being underfunded and few private attorneys willing to take such cases, the H-2A workers often lack access 

to the justice system. 

Once employers decide to apply for H-2A workers, guest workers 

are cheaper than U.S. workers for at least two reasons. First, the 

H-2A employer does not pay Social Security or unemployment tax 

on the guest worker’s wages but must do so on the U.S. worker’s 

wages. Second, guest workers’ vulnerability also means that they 

work to the limits of human endurance for lower pay than U.S. 

workers. These financial incentives lead to discrimination against 

U.S. workers by H-2A employers. Unfortunately, the main job preference for U.S. workers, known as the 50 percent rule, is not adequately enforced. 

The H-2A program also contravenes our democratic values. No 

matter how many years they work under the H-2A program, guest 

workers never obtain the opportunity to become permanent immigrants or citizens with the right to vote. Despite restored protections and unionization of some H-2A employers, systemic problems 

persist that the Department of Labor should stop. Illegal job terms 

are being approved by the Department of Labor. Employers frequently fail to pay the wages owed, often relying on a piece rate 

scam to cheat workers. Many employers fail to pay transportation 

costs home for migrant workers who complete the contract season. 

They tell the Department an artificially long season, for example, 

from April to November, even though few people are needed for 

that length of time. When workers leave at the end of the summer, 

due to lack of work, such employers refuse to pay transportation 

costs home and claim the workers abandoned their contract but 

will recall them the next year if they don’t complain. 

My written testimony includes the complaint of H-2A workers 

hired to pick strawberries at Bimbo’s Best Produce in Louisiana. In 

addition to violations of basic protections, these workers experienced frequent verbal abuse and feared for their safety due to their 

employer’s violence. 

In conclusion, the H-2A program abuses are rampant and should 

be cleaned up. More than 1 million undocumented farm workers, 

at least one-half the workforce, are making U.S. agriculture productive but suffer low wages and poor working conditions. We need 

to stabilize the agricultural workforce and keep agriculture productive by allowing undocumented workers to obtain legal immigration 

status and by improving wages and working conditions. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Goldstein follows:] 

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Mr. GALLEGLY. Thank you very much, Mr. Goldstein. 

Mr. Wicker, in North Carolina, the North Carolina Growers Association have been sued, as you mentioned in your testimony, 

something—what? 30 times for using the H-2A program. Would 

you consider any or a good portion of these lawsuits as being frivolous? Could you explain? 


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Mr. WICKER. Yes, we do consider some of the litigation to be frivolous. It is expensive, and we have been sued by attorneys that get 

tax dollars from the United States Congress through the Legal 

Services Corporation. And these are small farmers who are trying 

to defend themselves, and they are frequently attacked on technicalities in the H-2A program. And so, yes. The answer to your 

question is we do believe that. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Can you tell me why your growers use the H-2A 

program when it would appear that maybe it might be much easier 

to just hire illegals? 

Mr. WICKER. Well, I think the primary reason is that they want 

to comply with the law, and then a very close second would be that 

they want farm workers on the farm and there is not an adequate 

supply of farm workers in North Carolina. The estimates range 

anywhere from 50,000 to 80,000 farm workers in North Carolina, 

but that is not necessarily on the ground at any given time when 

you need to plant, cultivate, or harvest crops. These crops are timesensitive. And so these growers have put their faith and relied on 

the H-2A program that Congress has authorized to be able to have 

legal farm workers on their farms when they need them to plant 

and harvest crops. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Thank you. 

Mr. Goldstein, isn’t it true that if illegal immigrant farm workers 

were granted amnesty as in AgJOBS, they would be likely to leave 

the Ag fields and seek easier jobs in the city? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. I don’t believe that is true for the bulk of the agricultural workers. The AgJOBS earned legalization program would 

require people to prove that they have been working in American 

agriculture recently and then would be obligated to work an additional 3 to 5 years in American agriculture in order to be able to 

earn an immigration status. During that time, it would be our goal 

to work with employers and government to improve wages and 

working conditions to retain those workers and stabilize the farm 

labor force. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. But once they get their amnesty or designation 

legal, would they likely stay in agriculture? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. I believe that many of the people who perform 

farm work actually enjoy it and that if employers act like capitalists in our market economy and don’t have easy access to undocumented workers in the future, then the employers will do what is 

necessary to attract and retain employees, just the way I hope I do 

the necessary things in my organization to attract and retain our 

low-paid attorneys and health professionals. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. As I have said in some of my earlier comments, 

I live in a large Ag district in California, and while many people 

do come to this country because of the Ag industry and how easy 

it is to get a job in agriculture illegally, historically they are only 

there long enough until they can get into construction or some 

other job that either pays more. That is pretty common knowledge. 

Would you not say that that is pretty fair? I don’t think everybody 

really enjoys being on their knees picking strawberries or any number of other row crops for the rest of their life. 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. You know, if you are making less than minimum 

wage and you don’t have the same rights as other workers, of 

85 

course. But in many places now around the country, farm worker 

groups are working with employers to actually upgrade these jobs 

and improve, and many growers now are having multiple crops so 

they extend their season. So it is not like you work 6 weeks and 

then you are gone to the next employer. These workers are settling 

out in areas where they get 8 or 10 months’ worth of work. And 

as you say, there are some employers paying enough, $28 an hour. 

Mr. Wicker’s proposal is to pay basically under $8 an hour under 

the H-2A program. Well, what U.S. worker would apply for a job 

at an H-2A employer, if they can make $28 an hour, but would only 

be paid $8 an hour? And what employer would pay $28 an hour 

if they could enter the H-2A program and pay less than $8 an 

hour? 

Mr. GALLEGLY. I thank the gentleman. 

The gentlelady from California, the Ranking Member, Ms. 

Lofgren? 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

In terms of evaluating the testimony, the North Carolina Growers Association—you don’t yourself grow crops or run a farm. You 

represent growers. Correct? 

Mr. WICKER. We are a growers cooperative, and we have a board 

of directors that are—five board of directors who are all farmers. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Right, thank you. 

Mr. WICKER. We have advisory committees that are made up—— 

Ms. LOFGREN. I don’t have very much time. 

You get fees, correct, from the growers for the H-2A program? 

They pay you to submit paperwork for them. Is that correct? 

Mr. WICKER. I am employee of the growers association, and they 

pay the—— 

Ms. LOFGREN. Right, but the association gets the fees from the 

growers to help them with this program. Is that correct? 

Mr. WICKER. Well, they pay fees to employ me and my colleagues 

at the office and then—— 

Ms. LOFGREN. But the source of the fees is from the—— 

Mr. WICKER. And then we pay fees to the workers to reimburse 

them for their transportation costs. 

Ms. LOFGREN. But the source of the fees is the H-2A program. 

Correct? 

Mr. WICKER. I am sorry. Again, please. 

Ms. LOFGREN. The source of the fees is associated with the H2A program? 

Mr. WICKER. The source? I don’t understand. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Never mind. I can see I am going to lose all of my 

time asking you this question because I think there is a reason 

why you would oppose the AgJOBS program, which is that the association is funded through fees associated with the H-2A program 

which I really think the answer here is something like the AgJOBS 

proposal. 

I mean, listening to my colleague from California, Mr. Lungren, 

you are right. The H-2A program is not working and it is not going 

to work. We are not going to get a million and a half people a year 

into the United States on the H-2A program. It ain’t going to happen. And as I look at what is happening, increased I-9 audits, increased ICE enforcement, put aside the e-Verify program, we are 

86 

going to have a crisis in Ag with no workforce unless we do something about AgJOBS. 

Mr. Goldstein, I was interested in your testimony about the 

streamlining in the 1990’s that would have really created a farm 

labor system that would exploit workers. It sounded a lot like the 

Bracero program of years ago. 

The groups that were traditionally at odds, the farm workers 

union, the growers, came together to support—and I thought it was 

a surprise actually—the AgJOBS bill. Can you explain how those 

divergent perspectives were able to compromise when traditionally 

they were at odds so that they could support the AgJOBS bill as 

more beneficial than the H-2A bill? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Well, groups like mine and the United Farm 

Workers Union and others were banging their head against the 

wall, saying, look, we want a repeat of the 1986 special agricultural 

worker program that just granted legal immigration status to the 

undocumented farm workers and leave it at that. And agribusiness 

groups had numerous legislative proposals that would basically 

have slashed the wage rates under the H-2A program and done 

what is being asked by some witnesses here today to do. We all 

tried to get these bills passed, and they weren’t happening. 

But our job is to help farm workers improve their wages and 

working conditions. They want to work in agriculture and they 

want to be treated well, and growers need a productive labor force. 

So there is this strange bedfellows’ negotiation that occurs over a 

period of time, led by the United Farm Workers Union and the National Council of Agricultural Employers and other groups, and 

they fought over every ‘‘is,’’ ‘‘the,’’ and ‘‘and’’ and came up with the 

AgJOBS bill. And it is a very balanced approach. It is just ironic 

that for several years now, I go on these road shows talking with 

these grower representatives, and on almost every other issue, we 

are at each other’s throats, but on this one we agree. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Could I ask a question? One of the questions—the 

H-2A program, as we have discussed, is tied to a single employer, 

which I think is a flaw in terms of the potential for abuse. How 

does the AgJOBS bill address this flaw? And how would you keep 

from releasing a worker from a singular employer to prevent abuse 

and yet maintain an adequate Ag labor force? Does the AgJOBS 

bill address that? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Well, the AgJOBS bill would address the main 

agricultural need in this country by offering a chance for undocumented farm workers to legalize their status, and then it would 

make additional changes to the H-2A program. Unfortunately, a 

number of us are critical of the changes that wouldn’t be made in 

the H-2A program. It would not—— 

Ms. LOFGREN. But the question was really about the AgJOBS 

bill. 

I would just close in noting that although I think there are many 

workers in Ag who are not treated well, I had the privilege of going 

out to visit with strawberry pickers over in Davenport last year, 

and they were represented by the United Farm Workers. They had 

an income of about $18,000 a year. They had health care. They had 

a 401(k). It is a modest living, but it was a decent living. And yet, 

I noticed that it was still entirely an immigrant workforce. I give 

87 

credit to the farm workers and the growers that are working with 

them, but I think there are a lot of elements of farm work that 

have enticed immigrants into the field. 

And with that, I would yield back to the Chairman. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The gentleman from California, Mr. Lungren. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Goldstein, in 1986 when we passed the Simpson-Mazzoli bill, 

I swallowed hard and accepted the SAW/RAW program against my 

best inclinations, but wasn’t that supposed to do what you are talking about here? The SAW program, the Seasonal Agricultural 

Worker program; RAW program, the Replenishment Agricultural 

Worker program. Those who could prove that they had worked in 

the field then got a status here in the United States so that they 

were able to continue to work in the agricultural field. 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. It was, and what happened was—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. A lot of them left. 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. A whole bunch of farm workers stayed in agriculture for many years, but there was no real immigration enforcement. Agribusiness was able to hire undocumented workers. There 

was no real effort to upgrade the laws about wages and working 

conditions for farm workers, which discriminated against farm 

workers as an occupation. And so the workers had limited bargaining power, and there was—— 

Mr. LUNGREN. So my point is that is the reason why they left agricultural work? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. People leave jobs when the conditions and the 

wages are poor. 

Mr. LUNGREN. So if the conditions and wages were better than 

they had been in the intervening years, the great bulk of them 

would have stayed in agriculture? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. I think a substantial percentage would have 

stayed in agriculture if wages and working conditions substantially 

improved. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Isn’t that sort of contrary to the experience of just 

about every other group in America, that they start in jobs sort of 

analogous to agriculture, but they move on to other things. They 

want their children to have a better life and then, if they have a 

chance, they have a better life. Isn’t that true? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Sure, and it is going to be true for some people. 

They will go into agriculture and then they will leave. 

Mr. LUNGREN. So how do we maintain a sustainable workforce 

in agriculture if you are going to have that continuing aspiration 

of people to move on to other things? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Well, the Economic Policy Institute just issued 

a report authored by Professor Philip Martin of the University of 

California at Davis that said that we can improve the wages of 

farm workers by 40 percent in this country and just raise the cost 

of fruits and vegetables to families in this country per year by $16. 

A 40 percent wage increase would keep a lot of farm workers. He 

also pointed out that we have a positive trade balance on fruits and 

vegetables. 

Mr. LUNGREN. So let me ask Mr. Sequeira. How do you respond 

to those statistics and analysis? 

88 

Mr. SEQUEIRA. Well, Congressman, I think no disrespect to 

economists. When I was at the Department of Labor, the Department’s chief economist was in my office, but you can’t get two 

economists to agree on the time of day. 

Mr. LUNGREN. No, no. Ronald Reagan said if you took every 

economist in the world and you laid them down end to end, they 

wouldn’t reach a single conclusion. 

Mr. SEQUEIRA. Right, or the old joke about every economist has 

two hands and that’s the problem because on one hand, it is this, 

and on the other hand, it is something else. 

I think the record in history is clear that there is a perennial 

shortage of American farm workers in this country, that we have 

had foreigners come to this country to harvest our fruits and vegetables for the better part of 100 years, that farm workers who were 

in this country illegally in the 1980’s and that achieved a legalization, moved on to other jobs. And I don’t think anyone would blame 

them for that. As you noted, the history of immigration in this 

country is people come in and work at lower skilled jobs and in successive generations, they move up the economic ladder. 

Mr. LUNGREN. See, that is why—I mean, Mr. Goldstein mentioned strange bedfellows in his coalition to get together with their 

group. We have strange bedfellows here. It is called the Senate and 

the House. And my best inclination is the Senate and the House 

are not going to pass the AgJOBS bill. 

The SAW/RAW program has not done what it was supposed to 

do. 

We are probably going to have e-Verify. I doubt anybody running 

for President, including the incumbent, is going to run on the fact 

that he is going to be softer on immigration enforcement than he 

has been. 

We are going to have, as the gentlelady from California agreed 

with me, a crisis in agriculture. And while it sounds great to say, 

man, AgJOBS will take care of it, it is not going to pass. It is not 

going to pass because it has frankly what, Mr. Goldstein, you want 

to have in there, a path to citizenship which has been what has 

doomed all the immigration reforms in the past two Administrations. And I say that with regret. 

So we can say that agriculture is going to be the bystander here, 

but agriculture in many ways is going to be—and I hate to say it— 

a victim or they are going to be maybe not the coincidental victim 

in this. Maybe this is the intention. I don’t know. Maybe some people think it is great. We will have Ag collapse and that will force 

a decision. I just think that is shortsighted, and I am struggling 

to find a response to this when, in fact, the history has been that 

we have had a significant number of foreign workers in agriculture 

long before you ever saw it in construction, long before you ever 

saw it in landscaping, long before you ever saw it in hotel/recreational. I think that is a fact. And if that is, then I think we are 

duty-bound to try and respond to that. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Would the gentleman yield for a brief comment? 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The time of the gentleman has expired. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I would unanimous consent that the gentleman be 

given an additional 30 seconds. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Without objection. 

89 

Ms. LOFGREN. You and I have talked often on this subject, and 

I think one of the—and I wasn’t in the Congress during the Reagan 

amnesty. 

Mr. LUNGREN. I was very young then and we did not call it ‘‘amnesty.’’ 

Ms. LOFGREN. I know you were. But there was no provision for 

the future flow of employees coming in, and I think there were enforcement issues. 

Mr. LUNGREN. I understand. If I could reclaim my time, I will 

just say one of the responses to that failure to have a continuing 

flow was the other side, if I might say, said we will solve that problem with the SAW/RAW program. We did pass it. It didn’t, and we 

have this problem that confronts us today. 

I thank the gentleman for the extra time. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. The Ranking Member of the full Committee, Mr. 

Conyers? 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you, Mr. Gallegly. 

Mr. Goldstein, it has been predicted here that we will never get 

an Ag bill through and we know it. 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. I am sorry. I couldn’t hear. 

Mr. CONYERS. I said it has been predicted here that we will 

never get an Ag bill through and we know it. And even though we 

know it, are you familiar with what is in that bill? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Yes. 

Mr. CONYERS. Roughly? Well, tell me a couple of things that are 

in it. We have tried to rearrange the way that we process immigrants from an illegal status to a legal status. Right? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Right. 

Mr. CONYERS. What else? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Well, it just seems to me that if groups like ours 

and the United Farm Workers Union and others could actually 

reach an agreement with the employer groups that we have 

reached an agreement with, Congress should be able to reach a 

similar agreement. 

In the AgJOBS bill, in the transition from undocumented status 

to legal immigration status, it would require workers to stay in agriculture for 3 to 5 years. I characterize previous proposals like 

that as indenture servitude. To reach a compromise, farm worker 

advocates have recognized we have to make concessions like that. 

We did. 

On the H-2A program, as part of a broader comprehensive reform 

of agriculture, we agreed that under AgJOBS that the H-2A could 

shift from labor certification to labor attestation. What that means 

is instead of more Government oversight over the way these H-2A 

employers abuse guest workers, we will agree to less Government 

oversight to make it quicker for them to get access to guest workers. 

This is a complex, long, painful compromise, and it just seems to 

me Congress should be more open to adopting it rather than fight 

these battles over these ideological issues about immigration on 

and on and on for decades. 

Mr. CONYERS. Well, let me ask you this. There has been agreement between the major parties already, the unions and the employers. Is that much correct? 

90 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Correct. 

Mr. CONYERS. Well, then what is so impossible if we could get 

beyond ideology and a little partisanship every now and then? Why 

can’t the Congress get to it? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. Congressman, there are people all over the country who I report to who ask me that question all the time, and I 

don’t have a logical answer. I wish that were not the reality. 

Mr. CONYERS. Well, do you have an opinion? 

Mr. GOLDSTEIN. I have an opinion. My opinion is that Congress 

should get down to it and pass the AgJOBS bill and give farmers 

the legal workforce that they want and get done with this ideological battle about immigration. It will help farm workers improve 

their conditions for years into the future and help us maintain a 

positive trade balance and keep us providing—keep getting healthy 

food that we need. 

Mr. CONYERS. This is a very friendly Subcommittee, as you found 

out. I will yield to Mr. Lungren to explain to you what is more difficult. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Well, if the gentleman would yield. I would be 

happy to ask the gentleman in return what is ideological about the 

basic question of citizenship in the United States? Because that is 

what we are talking about. The farmers on their side did engage 

in the negotiations, but you say those are the principal parties. 

There are also those who are not involved in agriculture, the 

greater American public, who I think has a right to be heard on 

the question of the importance of American citizenship and whether or not you have people who go to the front of the line. Now, 

some would say that those in agriculture have earned a cut in line 

because they have been working here. others would say those who 

remained in their countries from whom the agricultural workers 

came or other people who came to this country illegally—those who 

remained behind to follow the law would feel that they were cheated by being negatively impacted for following the law. 

And I don’t think that is ideological. I don’t think there is anything ideological when you are on the playground or whether you 

are in school in first, second, or third grade and you are lined up 

for water, you are lined up for lunch, and someone cuts in. It is 

not an ideological thought that that is unfair that someone has cut 

in. It seems to be an essential issue of fairness. 

And all I am saying is in my estimation the reason why AgJOBS 

could not go forward is an intrinsic piece of it was that people got 

to jump in front of the line. Again, we can argue about whether 

that is fair, whether because you have had some years in the 

United States working while your fellow citizens from the country 

that sent you or that you came from don’t have a chance to come 

to the United States, but that is an argument that I think is not 

ideological. I think that is a fair-minded argument that ought to be 

dealt with on its merits. 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you, sir. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Would the gentleman yield? 

Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Chairman, I ask for 2 additional minutes, if 

it pleases the Chair. 

91 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Without objection, there will be 2 additional minutes, but we will summarize and adjourn this meeting by 12 

o’clock. 

Mr. Conyers? 

Mr. CONYERS. Thank you, sir. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Would the gentleman yield? 

Mr. CONYERS. I yield to the gentlelady. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Just briefly. In listening to Mr. Lungren, I think 

that the issues that he has raised, which I think trouble him more 

than they trouble me, can be accommodated. In fact, there are 

many occasions when, if it is an employee we need to make the 

business run, we put them in the front of the line because that is 

what everybody needs who needs employment. But if it is an issue 

about when the residence attaches, that can be dealt with. That 

could be dealt with in good faith, and I would suggest that we 

should discuss that further probably not on C-SPAN. 

I do think that the stability of having someone with a permanent 

status—it is not citizenship. It is a legal permanent resident status 

so that they have some portability, they have some standing so 

they can’t be exploited—is an important concept. Mr. Goldstein has 

mentioned it. Economists have mentioned it. Really, the Department of Labor witness talked about the ability to exploit people if 

they are dependent upon a sponsoring employer year after year. 

So I do think that there are the elements here of consensus. And 

it is hard to move forward on an immigration matter in this political environment because no matter what you do, somebody is 

going to start screaming about it. But I think that we could make 

this happen. 

And I will be happy to talk to Mr. Lungren further, if he is interested in doing that. I would hope that we could also talk to Mr. 

Berman who has been the lead sponsor on this for so many years 

and certainly the coalition of growers and the farm workers to see 

whether we could come up with some new element that addresses 

the issue that has been raised today and get to the finish line on 

this because if we don’t do this, if we don’t do this, we are, in fact, 

going to have a crisis in agriculture. And the H-2A program is not 

going to save it. We are just going to have a big, big problem. 

And I am willing to solve that problem, and I am hopeful that 

we can, in a bipartisan way, get it done because it is a freight train 

coming at us in Ag with the enforcement efforts that are going on. 

What do you think when you go in with an I-9 audit into ag? You 

are going to find at least half the workers can’t produce their papers. This is a disaster. And I hope that we can rapidly move forward. I pledge my best efforts. 

And I would yield back to Mr. Conyers and thank him for giving 

me the time. 

Mr. CONYERS. I thank Chairman Gallegly. 

Mr. GALLEGLY. Thank you, Mr. Conyers. The gentleman’s time 

has expired. All time has expired. 

I want to thank all of our witnesses today for their testimony. 

And without objection, all Members will have 5 legislative days 

to submit to the Chair additional written questions for the witnesses which will be forwarded and I ask that the witnesses reVerDate Aug 31 2005 15:05 Jun 29, 2011 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00095 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 H:\WORK\IMMIG\041311\65744.000 HJUD1 PsN: 65744
92 

spond as promptly as possible so that we may make the questions 

and their answers a part of the record of this hearing. 

With that, thank you for being here today, and the Subcommittee 

stands adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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