Head Down: Part II

Published: April 21, 2023, 6 a.m.

At the Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles last year, President Joe Biden outlined his plan to reduce the number of migrants seeking asylum at the Southern border. His administration, Biden said, would help \u201cAmerican farmers bring in seasonal agricultural workers from Northern Central American countries under the H-2A visa program.\u201d

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What does that mean for a program that\u2019s already plagued with wage theft and abuse?

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In the last installment of our two-part investigative series \u201cHead Down,\u201d we shift the focus to look at the systems put in place by the U.S. government and why they\u2019re constantly failing foreign agricultural workers in the H-2A visa program. As a result, we uncover millions of dollars in stolen wages that, instead of being returned to the workers, end up in the coffers of a U.S. government agency.