According to Mónica Ramírez, founder and president of Justice for Migrant Women, an Ohio-based organization that works to support immigrants working in the food service industry, “there is a direct correlation between increased sexual harassment in the workplace and talk of immigration enforcement.”
In fact, Ramírez tells The Progressive, since the start of the second Trump Administration and the ramped up operations of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), conditions for immigrant food service workers have deteriorated. “Perpetrators think they can do whatever they want, that their victims will not report abuse because they are so afraid of being fired, arrested, or deported,” she says. “We know that some bosses have threatened to call ICE when their workers complain about workplace conditions, sexual harassment, or verbal abuse. We’ve also heard many reports of sexual violence in detention facilities and, although we don’t have hard data on men pretending to be ICE agents and abusing women, we have anecdotal evidence, and have heard many reports, that this is happening all over the country.”
Moreover, while violence against female agricultural and food service workers has escalated since 2025—in factories, fields, food processing plants, catering halls, and restaurants—Ramírez says that women in every corner of the sector have long complained about and documented sexual harassment and sexual abuse in their workplaces.
Time magazine, for one, reports that between 65 and 80 percent of women farmworkers told interviewers that they’ve experienced some form of sexual violation on the job, from unwanted touching to suggestive comments to rape in the fields. This is also true in other parts of the industry, regardless of immigration status: A recent survey by Restaurant Opportunities Center United found that 80 percent of female servers who rely on tips were subjected to sexual harassment from bosses, customers, or coworkers.
Workers also report exploitation and abuse in food processing plants. Magali Licolli, cofounder and executive director of a woman-led Arkansas advocacy group called Venceremos, tells The Progressive that “fear of ICE has made it harder than ever to organize.” Licolli says that Venceremos, which works to improve conditions in non-union poultry plants, has continued to push for improved workplace conditions.
“Right now, the most urgent issue is bathroom breaks,” she says. “It depends on the plant and the supervisor, but in many places workers get just ten minutes in the morning and ten minutes in the afternoon to use the bathroom. In other places, workers get fifteen minutes twice a day, but that includes their lunch break. The ability of workers to drink water is also limited, so we are organizing around this.”
Other exploitation in food processing plants stems from required speed-ups in the pacing of work, which Licolli says ramped up during the COVID-19 pandemic. “Women on the line are expected to handle 174 birds per minute and debone forty to forty-five per minute,” she explains. “The speed causes a high rate of injuries, from the loss of fingers to carpal tunnel syndrome.”
Adding to the pressure on poultry workers, Licolli adds, are proposed changes to Temporary Protected Status and humanitarian parole, changes that could impact the more than 170,000 Salvadoran immigrants who currently work in Arkansas’s poultry plants. As proposed by the Department of Homeland Security, ending TPS or humanitarian parole for these workers (and those from Burma, Haiti, Venezuela, and other countries) will strip them of the right to live and work in the United States. The change is projected to take effect in September.
“These women were called essential workers during the pandemic,” Licolli says. “Now these same women are being persecuted and called criminals when the only thing they’re doing is working hard to sustain their households and feed our families.”
“People who have been in the United States for years, working, building community, and raising their families are very concerned about this,” she continues. “If they can’t work legally, they will be fired and will lose their health insurance and other benefits. Companies like Tyson Foods, one of the largest food service employers in Arkansas, have not said a word about this. They should. We think they have a moral responsibility to their immigrant workforce.”
Licolli knows that pushing Tyson to act in support of Arkansas workers may be a pipe dream, but one poultry company in the Delmarva Peninsula (located in Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia), Mountaire Farms, has tentatively stepped up, telling the administration that the cost of losing trained workers could cost them millions and undercut the food supply chain. But so far, Mountaire’s decision to speak out remains an anomaly.
Ending TPS and humanitarian parole, however, is not the only way the federal government is attacking immigrants in the industry.
The H-2A temporary agriculture program allows approximately 350,000 farm workers into the United States for a maximum of three years at a time. It, too, is facing enormous changes. The Economic Policy Institute notes that under the Trump Administration’s proposed rules, wage reductions will bring H-2A workers’ pay from between $15 and $20 per hour to between $8 and $17, and will allow employers who provide shelter to their employees to deduct housing costs from their paychecks. In addition, it will give employers the right to fire workers for protesting, organizing, or working too slowly.
Of course, if these shifts come to fruition, they will impact people of every gender. Still, Mónica Ramírez stresses that because immigrant women are particularly vulnerable to exploitation, they are uniquely at risk.
Justice for Migrant Women is doing what it can to oppose ICE raids, stop immigration status restrictions, and end endemic sexual harassment in the industry, including educating lawmakers at the local, state, and federal levels about what’s at stake. Their efforts to keep their communities safe have also led to enhanced security measures. “This means smaller gatherings, including non-public meetings and organizing on Zoom when people are afraid to leave their homes,” Ramírez explains. “We’ve also worked with the Mexican, Guatemalan, and other consulates in Ohio, since immigrants tend to trust them, to make sure that their staff inform everyone coming in about their rights in the workplace and educate them about sexual harassment and abuse.”
Since the start of the second Trump Administration, Justice for Migrant Women has expanded services to offer direct support work to the immigrant community, and periodically distributes fresh fruit and vegetables and supplies like toilet paper, detergent, soap, batteries, and clothing, to people in different parts of Ohio and Colorado.
“We’re humans helping humans in a really difficult time,” Ramírez says. “Immigrants, whether adults or children, are struggling with their mental health. They need support. But despite how difficult it’s been, I see it as an immense victory that so many people have come together to hold the line and push back against the Trump Administration and ICE.”