We Need Farmworkers, We Don’t Need Greedy Capitalists
by Jennifer Lin
COVID-19 is killing migrant farmworkers across the country. Farmworkers cannot socially distance as they work closely together and live in overcrowded housing. Many do not have access to bathrooms or clean water. While these essential workers risk their lives during a pandemic to put food on everyone’s tables, corporate farmers are denying them masks, paid leave, and hazard pay. How dare they, when Congress and the U.S. Department of Agriculture gave corporate “farmers” over $19 BILLION to boost their profits.
Over 70% of farmworkers are migrants. Even though they feed us all they do not get unemployment benefits or stimulus checks, food stamps or Medicaid. Because of their terrible working conditions, which can be taken away if unemployed, working or staying home is equally a death sentence. Now racist politicians are blaming them for spreading COVID-19.
Florida governor DeSantis is scapegoating migrant farmworkers for the state’s record surge in COVID-19 cases. He said these workers are “overwhelmingly Hispanic” and “you don’t want those folks mixing with the general public.” DeSantis is not just racist, he’s a liar. The state health department did not provide data to back his claims, and according to the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, most new cases have occurred in areas with little agriculture and is due to bosses bowing to corporate pressure to reopen and refusing to carry out measures to stop the spread. Beaches, bars, and right-wing churches are packed disease-spreaders. COVID-19 cases in Florida are spreading in migrant communities at a deadly rate because DeSantis and the capitalists do not care about the people. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers (farmworkers), have been demanding tests, contact tracing, quarantine spaces, PPE, and relief funds for the county’s farmworkers since April. DeSantis has ignored their demands.
Farmworkers are joining hundreds of meatpacking workers, warehouse workers, healthcare workers, hospitality workers, teachers, firefighters, longshore workers, and more in strikes to demand essential protections. In Wasco, CA, workers in the union United Farm Workers organized a strike and picket line after 150 of 200 workers at Primex Farms, a nut company, tested positive for COVID-19. After ignoring workers’ demands for PPE, social distancing, and sick leave, Primex retaliated against the workers by firing them. But these workers will not back down; they demand to return to their jobs under safe conditions. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers and the United Farm Workers have started petitions around their demands.
Trump and Democrat politicians are killing essential workers. They are giving billions to agribusiness and Agribanks but withholding benefits to farmworkers. They do not care if we starve or die; they want to send us all back to work so that they get can get rich off our backs. These greedy capitalists are waging war on us, and farmworkers and other essential workers are on the frontline, fighting back. Without farmworkers, we don’t eat. It’s time we stand in solidarity with farmworkers and demand protection for them and all the essential workers who keep us alive!