Undocumented farmers living in the United States believe they are treated as if they were not human beings, and nearly all of the 2,250 surveyed by the UFW Foundation fear likely detention and deportation under the Trump administration's aggressive enforcement of immigration laws.
“I am afraid of going out to work and not returning home to see my daughters,” said Yazmín, a farm worker born in Hidalgo, Mexico, who is protected from deportation under the DACA program. “I don't know what I would do if I met those masked men, who I don't know if they are kidnappers.”
Jazmín's testimony was presented as the authors of the report called “Under the Sun and Out of the Shadows: Fears, Hopes and Aspirations of Undocumented Farmworkers Affected by Trump-era Control Measures,” reported that 88% of the 2,250 farmworkers surveyed – the majority from California – expressed concern about falling prey to continued immigration raids and mass deportations.
The results of the research were announced this Thursday at a conference in Los Angeles.
Family separation worries
“Undocumented farmworkers are often treated as if they were not important human beings, as if their fears, aspirations and concerns were not relevant enough to be taken into account,” says the study, led by Jonathan Angulo, research and policy analyst at the UFW Foundation and adjunct professor at San Diego State University, Imperial Valley campus.
The authors of the 29-page report interviewed farm workers in California as well as the states of Washington, Michigan, Georgia and 12 others.
Other results indicate that 90% of the farmers responded that their main concern was family separation, that is, 2,225 out of a total of 2,250.
“I fear for my parents,” Andrés Alonso Felipe, a US citizen and agricultural worker from Oxnard, California, told La Opinión. His parents are originally from Michoacán, Mexico.
Alejandro Herrera, senior research and data analyst for the UFW Foundation, said protecting participants' confidential information was critical to completing the report because respondents knew their privacy would be protected.
There is a lawsuit against Trump
Erica Lomelí Corcoran, executive director of the UFW Foundation, said that for too long, academic and government researchers, as well as policymakers, have faced significant barriers to accessing comprehensive data on the people whose lives are most directly affected by immigration raids.
He emphasized that “Under the Sun and Out of the Shadows” is the first in-depth study to examine the concerns and fears of undocumented farmworkers, as well as their hopes and aspirations.
“We hope that this survey sheds light on the situation and allows those in power to understand the reality experienced by the most vulnerable sectors,” he said.
The representative of the UWF Foundation indicated that the data collected has been shared with legislators and congressmen to educate them about the reality that hundreds of thousands of families are experiencing.
Currently, the UFW Foundation and its sister organization, the United Farm Workers (UFW), are suing the Trump administration and the Department of Labor for cutting farmers' wages by between $3 and $7 per hour.
“It was a rule approved in November 2025 and took effect immediately,” the foundation reported. “It is unfair and also illegal.”
Agricultural workers: 45% undocumented
California's approximately 300,000 farmworkers, including Yazmín, her husband Andrés Alonso and her parents, help produce more than 350 food products for the entire United States. This production includes a third of vegetables and almost two thirds of fruits and nuts. Additionally, 90% of the country's strawberries are harvested in the “Golden State.”
According to the UFW Foundation, of the nearly 2.5 million farmworkers in the United States, about 70 percent are immigrants and more than 45 percent are undocumented immigrants.
Because of their immigration status, many are vulnerable to wage theft and other unfair labor practices.
This situation affects salaries, labor rights, as well as the health and safety of these workers and their families. Undocumented immigrants are more vulnerable to exploitation and less likely to take action due to fear of deportation.
In fact, Erica Lomelí Corcoran reported that the foundation she directs has handled almost half a thousand cases of agricultural workers arrested by ICE and has provided them with legal advice. However, he could not reveal how many of them managed to avoid deportation.
Jonathan Angulo, the foundation's research analyst, stated that 13% of the people surveyed, that is, approximately 300 out of 2,250, fear suffering persecution in their places of birth.
“[The percentage] reflects qualitative terms of the fear of being murdered and extortion: they say that if they return to their town or community they have to give an amount of money to the drug traffickers because, if they don't, they will kidnap their families,” Angulo told La Opinión. That was the reason why they did not ask respondents about their country of origin.
