Georgia sues to fight Biden’s push to boost farmworkers’ rights
ATLANTA, Ga. (WALB) - A new regulation to benefit foreign seasonal farmworkers is being challenged in Georgia federal court.
According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Georgia has teamed up with a coalition of Republican-led states – and with a group of Georgia growers – to halt a new federal rule that would bring expanded protections to migrant farmworkers on temporary visas.
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The new rule, currently set to go into effect this summer, reinforces that farmers are prohibited from holding or confiscating workers’ ports, and requires that vehicles used to transport workers be equipped with seat belts.
It also allows workers to invite guests to their employer-provided housing – in the H-2A migrant farmworker program, employers are required to give their seasonal migrant workers, most of whom come from Latin America, free housing, per the release.
The people behind the lawsuit say the new organizing rights amount to government overreach, and that they risk putting growers out of business.
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Attorney Braden Boucek with the Southeastern Legal Foundation says “This rule imposes costs on food producers at a time when Americans are already reeling from the high price of groceries. Before those costs should be imposed, the American people should get a chance to debate it and hold their elected leaders able for the choices they make. They cannot do that with the unelected bureaucrats responsible for this rule.”
The suit against the Biden istration’s Department of Labor, the federal agency responsible for overseeing the H-2A program, was filed in Brunswick.
The only two non-state entities involved in the suit are the Georgia Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association, a trade group, and Miles Berry Farm, a 400-acre blueberry producer in Appling County.
For more on the rule and the lawsuit click here.
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