Farm workers in Georgia: 'modern day slavery'

Tell Biden Administration to investigate H-2A program after Georgia slavery and human trafficking allegations 

 

By United Farm Workers Union (UFW)
 

Earlier this month, the UFW and a coalition of labor, civil and immigrant rights' organizations sent a letter demanding a thorough audit and investigation into the H-2A agricultural guest worker program. This occurred after Operation Blooming Onion resulted in at least 54 indictments that included forced labor trafficking, human smuggling and money laundering—among others—in a years-long exploitation of workers on South Georgia farms.

According to the Department of Justice, the workers were "required to dig onions with their bare hands, paid 20 cents for each bucket harvested, and threatened with guns and violence to keep them in line. The workers were held in cramped, unsanitary quarters and fenced work camps with little or no food, limited plumbing and without safe water. The conspirators are accused of raping, kidnapping and threatening or attempting to kill some of the workers or their families, and in many cases sold or traded the workers to other conspirators. At least two of the workers died as a result of workplace conditions."

What we are seeing with the H-2A program in Georgia — and likely elsewhere in America — amounts to "modern day slavery." This is an especially gruesome example, but it's not isolated. This story is a clear symptom of a program that needs urgent intervention.

Sign the petition today. Join our coalition in demanding the Biden Administration immediately implement policies to stop the abuses in the H-2A program, such as those exposed in Operation Blooming Onion.