Many aspects of U.S. food production have the hands of immigrant labor involved in the process today. That fact is a key reason bovine veterinarians can benefit from considering how to help their beef and dairy clients be prepared if Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials show up at farms and other facilities.
“Many of [the] employees are unfortunately undocumented, and farms have been the subject of ICE raids,” says Fred Gingerich, DVM, American Association of Bovine Practitioners (AABP) executive director.
Gingerich addressed the topic and offered some practical recommendations during a recent AABP Have You Herd podcast with program guest Rick Naerebout, executive director of the Idaho Dairymen’s Association. The association is a producer owned and governed organization in Idaho, representing dairy farm families throughout the state.
Here are three of the key takeaways from their discussion:
1. Encourage beef and dairy producers to proactively put legal counsel in place that is specific to immigration — has that as a specialty in their practice.
Do this first step as soon as possible, Gingerich and Naerebout encourage.
“…Make sure that you have legal counsel lined up and you have that phone number readily available for anybody that you anticipate that might be that first point of contact with ICE if they show up on the facility,” Naerebout says
2. Establish a chain of command (COC) on the farm that all employees are aware of and know how to articulate to ICE officials.
Coach employees on how to implement the COC.
“…Guys, have a strategy worked out in advance, so you’re not trying to make it up on the fly,” Naerebout advises. “Because everything that has been reported to us in terms of what the experiences have been with ICE coming onto facilities these last few months is that those are very intense situations, and you typically don’t have the luxury of time or convenience on your side.”
Within that strategy, Naerebout recommends coaching employees who are not authorized to speak for the facility to be able to tell ICE officials that and how to reach the owner or key manager.
3. Encourage clients to post signage that clearly delineates between private and public places within facilities and/or on the farm.
Naerebout says such signage can help guide where ICE officials can go, depending on the type of warrant they show up with. He explains there are two common warrants ICE officials might have in-hand when they arrive:
One is an administrative warrant. The other is a judicial warrant:
An administrative warrant is going to come from, typically, the Department of Homeland Security and is not signed by a judge.
“With an administrative warrant, they can only go into public places,” Naerebout says.
As a simple rule of thumb, tell producers to consider wherever a UPS or FedEx driver can go to deliver packages on the farm or facility as a public place. Post signage designating those areas, as such.
A judicial warrant is going to be signed by a state or a federal judge, and that will give ICE authorization to go into private places within your client’s farm or facilities.
Naerebout says understanding the difference between those two warrants, and the access they provide, is a key piece that you need to try and make sure your clients and their employees have a clear understanding of at the onset.
“Again, [if ICE shows up] this is going to happen very rapidly, very aggressively, from what we’ve been shared with, so you want to really coach employees and have a strategy in place beforehand, so it’s somewhat second nature if it does happen on one of your facilities,” he says.
Gingerich asked Naerebout about what are an employer’s and an employee’s rights if they’re questioned by an ICE agent.
“Sit down with your legal counsel and really talk through what those rights are for the employees and the employers to understand, what they can and cannot do, and don’t have to answer,” Naerebout emphasized.
“I will say that the different ICE raids that we’ve seen around the country, and what’s been reported back to us, is typically they are coming in and they’ve got arrest warrants for individuals, and they are arresting those individuals,” he adds.
“In those situations, you have all your same Miranda rights that any of us would have. But again, I would strongly encourage this, talk through these situations with your legal counsel and have a good understanding of who’s going to talk to ICE and what they have to say.”
For more insights that you and livestock producers can use to prepare for a visit from ICE, AABP provided links to the following organizations:
National Immigration Law Center
American Immigration Council
American Immigration Lawyers Association
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