WASHINGTON — The Baker Ranch in the remote desert of Nevada could not survive without the immigrant guest workers who arrive from Mexico each year.
About 300 miles south Immigration is just as important in Las Vegas, which is increasingly a vacation playground for Americans of all political and socio-economic backgrounds, keeping the economy humming 24 hours a day, all day long. .
Immigration has become a source of fear and frustration for voters in this presidential election, and the outcome could lead the United States down two dramatically different paths. But immigrants who have been in the country for decades say sensitive issues have been drowned out by seemingly simple solutions supported by both parties.
Nowhere is the complex economic and social reality behind the searing political rift over immigration clearer than in Nevada, where an increasingly close election could be decided.
Here are the highlights of the Associated Press report:
The influx of illegal border crossings has long strained city and state resources, even in Democratic strongholds across the country, even as interactions between immigrants and law enforcement officials have sharply declined in recent months. Ta. Still, immigration has fostered job growth in ways that strengthen the economy and improve the fiscal health of the federal government.
Former President Donald Trump has backed a hard-line plan to force mass deportations, and Vice President Kamala Harris has called for a path to citizenship for the millions of people in the country illegally. But Harris also wants to increase funding for Border Patrol enforcement and strengthen existing Biden administration measures that tighten rules for migrants arriving at the southern border to seek asylum in the United States.
“I think our focus is completely on the border and not on the people who are already here and have lived here for years,” said an immigrant with the advocacy group Make the Road Nevada. said justice organizer Erika Marquez.
Both parties want to expand guest worker programs in agriculture.
Participation in the program increased during the Trump administration, as the Trump administration considers guest farm workers essential during the coronavirus pandemic. But he also proposed rules that would freeze farm worker pay for two years, ease housing requirements for workers and limit reimbursed transportation expenses.
The Biden administration has wiped out those rules. Since then, more than 310,000 H-2A visas have been issued in fiscal year 2023, compared to about 213,000 in fiscal year 2020, the last year under the Trump administration. But President Biden also imposed a series of new rules aimed at strengthening worker protections that sometimes frustrate owners of bakeries and other businesses.
“It’s a hot potato and both sides are lobbing at each other. And to be honest, both sides are to blame,” Janille Baker, who manages the ranch’s financial books, said of immigration. “There’s going to come a time when you have to deal with it. You can’t continue to incite fear and scare people and criticize people who are doing or don’t want to do any kind of work. .”
In Nevada, nearly 19% of residents are foreign-born and 9% of all employees do not have U.S. legal status. According to Department of Labor statistics, if a state were to illegally lose all its workers in the country, the direct job loss would stall tourism, trigger a wave of foreclosures in the housing market, and leave the state with: The losses will be roughly the same as those caused by the 2008 financial crisis, which caused significant damage. In the Great Recession that followed, it was 9.3% of employment.
“In our great 24-hour economy, these hotels and casinos cannot, should not, and cannot be open every day without immigrants,” said Peter Guzman, president and CEO of the Nevada Latin Chamber of Commerce. I know,” he said. .
And illegal roundups of people in the country may not count those in temporary protected status or Baker Ranch guest workers who are allowed to stay in the United States.
Heidi Zetino, who cleans luxury hotel suites at Harrah’s Casino on the famed Las Vegas Strip, is an immigrant from El Salvador who has only temporary protection in the U.S. She cannot vote as a non-citizen. Nevertheless, he worries that if he wins, the same thing could happen again.
“These people have no conscience,” she said of supporters of mass deportation. “They believe they can lift the country and move the economy forward, but they don’t think about the people at the bottom.”
Pew Research Center estimates that there are 11 million people in the country illegally. Large states like California, Texas, and Florida have large numbers of people who could have an even greater impact on their workforces and communities. However, all of these states are solidly red or blue in the presidential race, and are unlikely to swing the election in the same way as the crowded state of Nevada.
Even though Nevada only has six electors, it could choose between Trump and Harris. Clark County, which includes Las Vegas, is home to about 75% of the state’s population and has a significant number of hospitality workers represented by Nevada’s powerful Culinary Union, which supports Harris.
But Trump was able to win over a rare electorate in the state in 2020, performing well in most of the rest of the rural, more conservative state. Washoe County, home to Reno, is a place of constant turmoil. Voters can also choose their presidential candidate to be “nobody,” further reinforcing the notoriously fickle nature of Nevada’s electoral system.
Some voters remain uncertain about the outcome.
“I’m very scared,” said Nancy Valenzuela, a 48-year-old maid who works at the Strato Casino. “Some people don’t have papers. They’re like, ‘They want to kick us all out.’
