Increasing prices, decreasing workforce
President Elect Donald Trump says mass deportation efforts will get underway once he takes office on January 20.
An American Immigration Council report shows that the country’s GDP would shrink by 4.2% -- which hasn’t happened since the Great Recession between 2007 and 2009 -- and Florida will be among the top 3 states most affected.
According to the Pew Research Center, the population of undocumented immigrants in Florida grew by more than 400,000 from 2019 to 2022, reaching 1.2 million in 2022.
Rene Gomez is the Civic engagement coordinator at the Farmworkers Association of Florida.
He said if Trump follows through with his talk of mass deportation, it could mean even higher grocery prices as the agriculture sector takes a hit.
“Our agriculture prices have already risen up. The vegetables, the fruits, anything that has to be picked by hand, that is only going to go higher,” said Gomez. “People think it's bad now, but when you lose that workforce, and say you do replace them with citizens, a lot of these people that are getting paid are getting paid below minimum wage, so that's only going to increase the prices for everyday Americans.”
Gomez said not only will the agriculture industry take a hit, but construction will too.
According to the American Immigration Council report, mass deportation could lead to the loss of one in eight construction and agricultural workers across the country.
Gomez said the loss in workforce would negatively impact the U.S. economy as fewer people would be contributing. “A lot of the undocumented immigrants, even though they don't have papers, have an ITIN (individual tax information number),” he said. “They pay in hopes that in the future, when there's documentation and records that they've been paying taxes, that'll help their argument to get a citizenship.”
Undocumented immigrants paid $1.9 billion in state and local taxes in 2022, according to the American Immigration Council.
Already seeing impacts
In 2023, SB 1718 went into effect in Florida requiring businesses to verify the immigration status of employees using E-Verify.
“That was a huge burden for companies that used to employ more groups of people, and now they have to cap it at 25,” said Gomez.
He said the state’s immigration laws along with the fear of potential mass deportations is hindering Florida’s job market.
Gomez adds recent rule changes by the Florida Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles Department is adding to the issue.
“Public transportation here is not great. People don't have driver's licenses, and they just added a new policy at the DMV where you can no longer register a car with your foreign passport,” he said.
Hope for the best, prepare for the worst
In anticipation of President Elect Donald Trump taking office later this month, the Farm Workers Association is making education a top priority by making sure people understand the Fourth and Fifth Constitutional amendments. They deal with unreasonable search and seizures as well as self incrimination and due process.
“We're having ‘Know Your Rights’ trainings. Luckily, we have some lawyers in the community that are supportive,” said Gomez. “We want to teach them what they can do in situations where they are with ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement), whether it be at the workplace, at home, or in public.”
He adds there is also a group of community members working as a rapid response team to verify when ICE is in an area.
“We also have Family Plans. We have a list of documents that need to get in order, passports being one of them,” said Gomez. “If their child was born here, but they don't have a passport to their home country, and that parent gets deported, it's going to be much more difficult for that child to travel and reunite with their family.”
Gomez said some local businesses are preparing for a potential loss in clientele, but not everyone is worried about the potential mass deportations.
He said some people are approaching it similar to how some Floridians approach hurricane season.
“Unless it's a category four or five, we’re not really scared of it. Some people have been here so long where they're like, ‘we've heard threats every year that they want to deport us.’ Some people think that Trump is just talking and there's not going to be a mass deportation. It's our job to educate the members of what's going on and how they can protect themselves,” said Gomez.
Still, while some may wait to see the outcomes in Florida, Gomez is hearing that some people are already planning to leave the state.
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