What's at stake?
The Economic Policy Institute estimates a new rule from the U.S. Department of Labor could result in an annual loss of between $4.4 and $5.4 billion in wages for the nation’s farmworkers.
More than 100 farmworkers and supporters rallied outside Fresno’s federal courthouse on Wednesday, as an initial hearing in a national case challenging the Trump administration’s cuts to farmworker wages unfolded seven stories above Tulare Street.
In October 2025, the Department of Labor unveiled a temporary rule announcing a new methodology for calculating the minimum wage for guest agricultural workers hired through the H-2A visa program.
The rule also created a two-tiered wage rate based on skill level, and imposed an adjustment factor for H-2A workers who are provided housing by their employers at no cost.
The Department of Labor argued these swift changes were necessary in part because of “acute labor shortages and instability” in the agricultural sector brought on by the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration — and the fact that the sector has “long depended on a workforce with a high proportion of illegal aliens.”
Farmworkers and advocates quickly sounded the alarm that the changes would result in a drastic reduction to wages not just for H-2A workers, but also their domestic counterparts in the agricultural workforce.
Researchers from the Economic Policy Institute have since estimated H-2A workers could see their wages cut by somewhere between 26% and 32% each year. With the “downward pressure” those reduced wages for guest workers will place on domestic worker pay as well, U.S. farmworkers will likely see 9% reductions in pay. Combined, that’s an estimated $4.4 to $5.4 billion in wage cuts across all farmworkers.
In November, the United Farm Workers union — alongside the nonprofit UFW Foundation and 18 individual farmworkers — sued the Department of Labor over the changes.
On Wednesday, attorneys representing the farmworkers asked Judge Kirk E. Sheriff to issue a preliminary injunction to stop the Department of Labor from implementing the new rule that they say would trigger a “massive and unprecedented transfer of wealth” from farmworkers to their employers.
Sheriff heard arguments from attorneys Kuntal Cholera, who represented the farmworkers and their advocates, and Alexandra McTague Schulte, who represented the federal government.
Cholera questioned the Department of Labor’s reasoning that the labor shortage would call for lower, rather than higher, wages to fill the gap.
“Typical economic logic,” he said, “would tell you otherwise.”
Schulte argued the plaintiffs’ case was largely “speculative,” rather than providing ample evidence of wage cuts the farmworkers have experienced since October, when the rule took effect.
She also questioned why one of the plaintiffs who did experience a wage cut over the last five months didn’t attempt to negotiate with her employer — an argument Sheriff pushed back on, asserting that farmworkers “aren’t typically in a great position to bargain.”
After about two hours of questions and arguments, Sheriff said he would plan to issue a written ruling.
The case carries massive implications for millions of farmworkers across the country, including more than 850,000 that work in California.
Jose Luis Ramirez Leon, a Merced resident who’s worked in the fields since 1993, participated in Wednesday’s rally. He told Fresnoland he and his fellow farmworkers are worried about the cuts.
“It’s not fair because we do very tough work in the fields,” he said in an interview in Spanish. “Sometimes, we travel very far to gain very little.”
The rally and hearing fell on the same day that a New York Times investigation revealed allegations of rape and sexual assault against UFW co-founder Cesar Chavez.
In an interview with Fresnoland before the rally, UFW spokesperson Antonio De Loera-Brust said the union needs to both reckon with these revelations while keeping up the fight for farmworkers today.
“We need to be able to learn from our past and support victims, while also recognizing that the work needs to continue,” he said, “and that farmworkers today are worth fighting for, now more than ever.”
