We need your support in standing up for farm workers! This past September, the Department of Labor (DOL) proposed regulations that will improve the wages and working conditions of H-2A guest workers as well as U.S.-based workers. The H-2A program has widespread wage theft, numerous incidents of trafficking, sexual assault, and other forms of abuse and exploitation.

The proposed DOL regulations will help address this by:

• Strengthening workers’ rights to advocate, form a union, and access key services;
• Protecting workers from unjust firing and retaliation when they speak out;
• Prohibiting employers from confiscating travel documents to prevent human trafficking; and
• Targeting unlawful fees, fraud, and other abuses in the recruitment and hiring of workers.

The proposed DOL regulations are urgently needed, reflect many of the UFW Foundation’s recommendations over the last few years, and are one of the most effective ways for the federal government to improve farm workers’ lives right now.

This is why we need your support by submitting a comment on the next page.

Comment Template

I am writing this comment in support of our nation’s farm workers, whose hard work makes it possible for us to have food on our tables every day. The proposed regulatory changes to the H-2A agricultural guestworker program would reduce abuse, exploitation and trafficking of farm workers. Improving the H-2A program will in turn improve the wages and working conditions of U.S. workers. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, over half of farm workers are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents. The proposed changes would positively impact many of these farm workers and begin to address many of the systemic, abusive issues in the H–2A program.

I urge you to move forward in finalizing the proposed rules, in its strongest form, so that we have more accountability, transparency and oversight in the H-2A program, our workforce and the U.S.