April 2025
We demand that the farmworkers who have been arrested in the last weeks of March, whether in Massachusetts, New York, or Washington State, be released immediately from detention centers to return to their homes without further harassment. A truly sustainable system of food and farming is not possible without justice for all the people of the earth.
We call for an end to the attacks on the caring, hard-working people who come to our country seeking to provide a better life for their families. On March 20, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arrested four farmworkers associated with Red Fire Farm who were not charged with any crime. Similarly, on March 31, ICE arrested seven people who live at North Harbor Dairy Farm in Sackets Harbor, NY, three of them school-aged children, the youngest a third grader. In Washington State, they arrested Alfredo “Lelo” Juarez, a farmworker organizer with no criminal record. We protest these arrests of workers who are in this country to do work that very few US citizens are willing to do, and call for an end to the for-profit detention centers.
For farms to thrive, we need many hands. Farmwork is healthy, dignified labor with a deep social purpose. Farmworkers are not criminals, and their skills and dedication to craft ought to be revered in our society whether working on organic or conventional farms. There would not be food on our tables in this country without their labor.
The farmworkers who come to this country make enormous sacrifices, separating from their families for long stretches, missing important family milestones, even sickness and death, to contribute to the US food system. Non-citizens contributed $96.7 billion in taxes in the United States in 2022 and paid higher state and local tax rates than the top 1% of households in the vast majority of states, according to a study published in August by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Per capita, they paid $8,889 in total taxes. A full one-third of this money went towards programs that exclude them from benefits because of their citizenship status.
Organic farmers and the conscious eaters who seek out our products are a strong, diverse, entrepreneurial, and innovative community. Among us, descendants of enslaved people and fugitives from oppressive societies have contributed significantly to the advancement of organic and regenerative agriculture that is grounded in indigenous ecological knowledge. Organic agriculture has been greatly enhanced by the hard-working descendants of the original people of this continent–from Latin America up through Canada–who now have to migrate across national borders that cut across their own ancestral lands, just to make ends meet and to support their families.
We stand in solidarity with people who have been forced from their homelands by extreme poverty, paramilitary violence, and environmental devastation. To end the nightmare that characterizes current US immigration policy, we want comprehensive immigration reform that establishes fair and humane immigration policies with a pathway to citizenship for those who lack legal documents. We welcome the many farmers among the waves of people driven to our shores. We want them to receive land and resources for farming it.
We stand for respect for the humanity and dignity of all human beings and demand that the arrested farmworkers be set free. We commit to act on our beliefs.
Northeast Organic Farming Association Interstate Council (NOFA IC)
NOFA Connecticut
NOFA Massachusetts
NOFA New Hampshire
NOFA New Jersey
NOFA New York
NOFA Rhode Island
NOFA Vermont
