The vast majority of California voters support vital protections for farmworkers regardless of immigration status amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, a new survey conducted by the University of California, Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies has found.
“Most California voters (80%) support employers providing full replacement wages to farmworkers to stay home when sick with COVID-19,” researchers said, “while 79% support equitable pay for all farmworkers regardless of legal status or guest worker status, 71% support equitable medical and paid sick leave for both undocumented and documented farmworkers if they fall sick with COVID-19, and 94% support the provision of handwashing stations, personal protective equipment, and work conditions that enable farmworkers to practice social distancing.”
Researchers note that as many as 60% of farm workers in the state lack legal status (some estimates range as high as 75%), but “are left out of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) and ineligible for unemployment insurance and paid sick leave,” even though farm laborers have been deemed “essential” workers by the federal government.
“Among all respondents, 56% strongly approve that as essential workers, farmworkers should receive full replacement wages from their employers to stay home when sick with COVID-19,” researchers said. “However, only 30% of Republicans in the state agree farmworkers should receive full wages if they fall sick with COVID-19 compared to 73% of Democrats in the state.” Of course, they sure don’t mind the fruits and veggies they’re able to buy because of those undocumented workers, right?
“It’s a real partisan divide there,” University of Southern California demographer Dowell Myers told The Los Angeles Times. “Democrats see more of a cooperative organization to society and Republicans see it more as an individual struggle, and that if you have fallen down it is not because the system has conspired against you.”
Advocates have been fighting for the inclusion of undocumented families in federal relief, aided by progressive House members like Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington state and Rep. Judy Chu of California. “The fact that immigrants have been left out of all the earlier relief bills pains me to no end,” Chu said according to Roll Call at a recent town hall. While inclusion of these families remains an effort, California has announced a private-public fund that aims to assist some undocumented residents excluded from federal relief.
“At a minimum, if you’re part of a taxpaying family you should be eligible for benefits,” said Pili Tobar, deputy director of advocacy group America’s Voice. “At a time when everyone is struggling to adapt to this new normal, xenophobic exclusion is petty and counterproductive. Immigrant families pay taxes, work in grocery stores, clean hospitals, tend to the sick and help keep the country running in the midst of a pandemic that has ground most industries to a halt.”