DeSantis Attacks a Federal Farm Labor Bill Florida Growers Have Long Wanted

Governor Ron DeSantis publicly criticized a bipartisan federal bill overhauling the H-2A agricultural visa program this week, describing the legislation as not what voters supported. The measure, the Securing Agriculture's Workforce Act of 2026, would be the first statutory reform to H-2A in 40 years, and Florida is the largest user of the program in the country.

The bill, filed as H.R. 9535 by Representative Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania, has attracted 47 House Republican cosponsors alongside Democratic support and carries a strong endorsement from the American Farm Bureau Federation. It has also drawn opposition from immigration hardliners within the Republican conference, who describe a provision covering workers already in the country as amnesty.

The split puts Florida at the center of a genuine policy conflict rather than a partisan one. The state's fruit and vegetable growers have spent years asking Congress for exactly this kind of reform, and the governor's opposition places him against a constituency that has generally been aligned with him.

What the bill would do

The legislation makes changes to the accessibility and cost of agricultural labor under H-2A, the visa program that allows employers to hire foreign workers for temporary agricultural jobs. One central change removes the requirement that H-2A positions be seasonal, a restriction that has excluded year-round agricultural sectors including dairy from using the program at all.

The provision generating the loudest opposition would waive immigration law violations for agricultural workers and their employers where the work was performed before May 31, 2026. Supporters describe it as bringing an existing workforce into legal status; opponents describe it as amnesty for unlawful presence.

The bill also addresses program cost, an area where growers have complained persistently. H-2A employers must pay the Adverse Effect Wage Rate, a federally calculated minimum that in many states exceeds prevailing agricultural wages, along with housing and transportation costs for workers.

Why Florida is the state that matters most

Florida is the nation's largest user of the H-2A program. The state's agricultural sector, dominated by labor-intensive fruit and vegetable production rather than mechanized row crops, depends on hand harvesting for citrus, tomatoes, strawberries, peppers, sweet corn and other crops that machines cannot pick without damage.

Florida agriculture has repeatedly identified labor as its most pressing threat. Industry organizations have described the agricultural labor shortage as one of the greatest risks to fruit and vegetable production in the state, ranking alongside citrus greening disease and foreign competition in the list of existential pressures on the sector.

The economics are unforgiving. Crops that cannot be harvested within a narrow window are lost entirely, and a grower who cannot assemble a crew watches a season's investment rot in the field. That reality is why Florida's agricultural organizations have pushed for H-2A reform across multiple administrations of both parties.

The governor's objection

DeSantis raised his criticism on social media, arguing the bill departs from what voters supported on immigration. Florida has been among the most aggressive states on immigration enforcement, enacting state-level requirements on employment verification and cooperating extensively with federal enforcement through 287(g) agreements.

The tension between that enforcement posture and Florida agriculture's labor needs is not new. Florida's 2023 immigration law, which imposed E-Verify requirements on employers above a size threshold, drew warnings from agricultural and construction interests about workforce disruption, and reports of labor shortages followed its implementation.

The governor's position reflects a consistent view on enforcement rather than a reversal. What has changed is that the federal bill forces a choice between enforcement priorities and the stated needs of an industry that contributes substantially to Florida's economy.

Where Florida's congressional delegation sits

The 47 Republican cosponsors and the bipartisan structure of the bill mean the question inside the House Republican conference is not partisan alignment but a genuine internal division. Members representing agricultural districts face pressure from growers; members who campaigned primarily on immigration enforcement face pressure from the other direction.

Florida's delegation includes members from districts with substantial agricultural production, including areas of Southwest Florida, the Lake Okeechobee region and Central Florida citrus country, as well as members from urban and suburban districts where agriculture is not an economic factor.

How Florida members vote will be the clearest indicator of which pressure prevails in a state where both forces are strong. Individual positions have not been uniformly announced, and the bill has not been scheduled for a floor vote.

What it means for Floridians

For consumers, agricultural labor policy shows up in produce prices and in where produce comes from. When domestic production contracts because crops cannot be harvested, imports fill the gap, and the United States has steadily increased its share of imported fresh fruits and vegetables over the past two decades.

For agricultural communities in Florida, including Immokalee, Belle Glade, Plant City and the citrus belt, the stakes are employment and local economic activity. These communities depend on the agricultural cycle, and contraction affects packing houses, equipment dealers, transportation and retail alongside the farms themselves.

For workers, both domestic and H-2A, the bill's provisions on wage rates, housing and legal status determine working conditions. H-2A workers are entitled to specified housing and wage protections that workers without status do not have in practice, which is part of the argument for expanding legal channels.

How the H-2A program works today

An employer seeking H-2A workers must first obtain a temporary labor certification from the Department of Labor, establishing that there are not sufficient able and willing domestic workers available and that employing foreign workers will not adversely affect the wages and working conditions of similarly employed Americans.

That certification requires recruiting domestic workers first, through state workforce agencies and advertising, and documenting the results. Employers must then petition United States Citizenship and Immigration Services and workers must obtain visas at consular posts abroad, a sequence that takes months and that growers describe as poorly matched to agricultural timing.

Employers using the program must provide housing at no cost to workers, transportation to and from the place of employment, and pay at the Adverse Effect Wage Rate or the applicable prevailing wage, whichever is higher. They must also guarantee employment for at least three-quarters of the contract period.

Those obligations are what make H-2A expensive relative to informal hiring, and they are also what make it a genuinely regulated program with enforceable worker protections. The cost differential is the central economic fact underlying the policy debate.

What the seasonality change would mean

The requirement that H-2A jobs be temporary or seasonal has excluded year-round agricultural operations from the program entirely. Dairy is the most frequently cited example nationally, since cows require milking every day of the year and the work cannot be structured around a season.

Florida has year-round agricultural operations beyond dairy, including nursery and greenhouse production, aquaculture and certain livestock operations. Those employers currently have no agricultural visa program available to them and must rely on the general labor market.

Removing the seasonality requirement would open the program to those employers, which supporters describe as closing a gap and opponents describe as expanding a temporary worker program into permanent employment. Both characterizations are accurate descriptions of the same change.

Florida agriculture by the numbers

Florida agriculture spans citrus, vegetables, sugarcane, cattle, nursery and greenhouse products, and aquaculture, generating billions in annual output. The state leads national production in several categories, and its winter vegetable production supplies markets across the country during months when northern growing regions are dormant.

Citrus has contracted substantially over the past two decades under pressure from citrus greening disease, hurricanes and development, and acreage has fallen well below historical levels. That contraction has shifted the labor question toward vegetables, berries and nursery production, which remain labor-intensive.

The Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, headed by an elected commissioner, administers state agricultural programs and has been an advocate for labor availability. The department's positions on federal labor legislation carry weight in Tallahassee and in the state's congressional delegation.

Land pressure adds a further dimension. Florida agricultural land competes with residential and commercial development, and operations that cannot secure reliable labor frequently sell to developers, converting farmland permanently.

The politics inside the Republican coalition

The dispute over this bill exposes a division that has run through Republican politics on immigration for two decades. Business-aligned constituencies, including agriculture, construction and hospitality, have generally sought expanded legal channels for workers. Enforcement-focused constituencies have opposed anything that legalizes people who entered or remained without authorization.

Past attempts at agricultural labor legislation have foundered on exactly this split. Bills combining enforcement provisions with legal status for existing farm workers have passed one chamber and died in the other repeatedly, and the pattern has held across administrations of both parties.

What distinguishes the current moment is that the enforcement side has largely achieved its policy goals through executive action, which changes the negotiating dynamic. Growers now face a labor market shaped by enforcement at levels they have not previously experienced, and their urgency has increased correspondingly.

For Florida, the resulting position is awkward. The state has been among the most aggressive on enforcement while also being the largest user of the legal agricultural visa program, and the federal bill forces those two facts into direct conflict.

What's next

The bill awaits committee action and has not been scheduled for a House floor vote. Legislation of this kind frequently moves as part of a broader package rather than standing alone, and agricultural labor provisions have historically been attached to farm bills or appropriations measures.

Florida's harvest calendar continues regardless. Fall planting for winter vegetable production begins in the coming months, and growers make labor commitments well ahead of harvest, which means uncertainty about the program affects decisions long before any legislation would take effect.

The Florida Press will track the bill's progress, the positions of Florida's congressional delegation and the response from Florida agricultural organizations.