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  Rudy Puma

  US Correspondent

Donald Trump will accept his presidential nomination tomorrow night at the Republican convention in Wisconsin. That state was chosen deliberately: it is one of swing statesTrump won there in 2016, and in 2020 it went to Joe Biden.

Wisconsin is famous for its dairy industry. Farmers voted in large numbers. The majority of On Donald Trump, but now they face a devil’s dilemma: Dairy farms depend on immigrants from South America, from countries like Mexico, Guatemala and Nicaragua.

Tens of thousands Some of them don’t have valid papers. Donald Trump wants to deport them en masse. His tough immigration plans were the focus of the party’s convention yesterday. On Monday, Trump’s new running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, reiterated that illegal immigrants should be “deported.”

Dave Daniels owns more than 500 cows and is a board member of the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation, a trade organization. He voted for Trump in 2020, but is now rethinking that. Six of his eight employees are immigrant workers, like his supervisor, Moises, from Mexico.

“I milk the cows, clean the yard and mow the lawn.” According to Daniels, there are hardly any Americans available for the work. The jobs are tough and unemployment is historically low. “Without my employees, I’d have to learn how to milk myself again,” the German-born farmer jokes.

He doesn’t want mass deportations, but rather a more flexible immigration policy. For example, he advocates visas that allow immigrants to work longer than nine months, such as in seasonal agriculture. usual He is. His organization is lobbying for longer residency permits.

“They’re voting against their own interests,” says Erin Barbato, who teaches immigration law at the University of Wisconsin and regularly speaks to dairy farmers in the state. She says farmers rely heavily on mostly undocumented immigrant workers. “The Wisconsin dairy industry will lose 80 percent of its workers,” she predicts.
Donald Trump also personally relies on immigrant workers, including at his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida. Last year he had 136 seasonal workers Workers, especially wait staff, cooks and cleaners.

Farmer Daniels also points to the consequences for fruit growing, gardening and food service, but he expects things won’t move forward that quickly with Trump’s plans. “It’s all about rhetoric, because mass deportations would be hugely damaging to the American economy,” he says. But Barbato calls that wishful thinking and believes Trump will actually deliver.