WASHINGTON (Reuters) -There are no policy changes under way to exempt farm, hotel and other leisure workers from Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, the Washington Post reported on Friday, a day after the U.S. president vowed to issue an order for such workers.
Trump’s comments on Thursday were aimed at soothing industry leaders, but there will be no changes to current deportations, according to the report, which cited three people with knowledge of the administration’s immigration policies.
Representatives for the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report, which comes amid demonstrations protesting Trump’s immigration raids.
Trump’s border czar Tom Homan told the Washington Post that he had not discussed any changes for such workers with Trump and has not been involved in any policy plans to address them.
Farm and hotel industries rely heavily on migrant labor, and farmers were strong supporters of Trump’s 2024 re-election bid.
While Trump is carrying out his campaign promise to deport immigrants in the country illegally, protesters and some Trump supporters have questioned the targeting of those who are not convicted criminals, including in places of employment.
On Thursday, Trump acknowledged the impact of his immigration policies on some sectors and said he would issue a related order “soon,” giving no details.
“Our farmers are being hurt badly and we’re going to have to do something about that… We’re going to have an order on that pretty soon,” he said at the White House.
He added that it would also address the hotels sector, which would include the Trump Organization, Trump’s private business that has said it is being run by his adult sons.
“Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace,” he wrote on his social media platform before his Thursday remarks. “Changes are coming!”
U.S. farm industry groups have long sought to be spared from mass deportations, which could upend a food supply chain dependent on immigrants, and welcomed his comments.
Major hotel companies and casino operators did not return Reuters’ requests for comment.
Trump did not say what steps he would order or when they would come.
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told CNBC on Thursday that Trump was reviewing all possibilities but that Congress would also have to act, pointing to the H-2A visa program that allows employers to hire temporary or seasonal labor.
An immigration raid of an Omaha, Nebraska, meat-packing plant on Tuesday forced the company to operate with reduced staffing and caused concern among traders and analysts about how such raids could disrupt U.S. food production.
The United Farm Workers and California’s Democratic Senators Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff this week called for a stop to immigration enforcement actions targeting farmworkers after media reports of Tuesday raids at California farms.
In April, Trump suggested farmers could petition to keep some workers if the migrants left the country and then returned with legal status.
(Reporting by Susan Heavey, Jeff Mason, P.J. Huffstutter, and Doyinsola Oladipo; additional reporting by Bhargav Acharya, Aatreyee Dasgupta, Leah Douglas and Ted Hesson; Editing by Rosalba O’Brien, William Maclean)
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