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Glaize Immigration Testimony

Virginia Apple Grower Urges Congress to Act on Immigration Reform, Cites Economic Danger to Agricultural Communities

Former USApple Chairman Phil Glaize Joins Pundit Stephen Colbert and UFW President Arturo Rodriguez at House Hearing

Washington, DC − Virginia apple grower and former U.S. Apple Association (USApple) Chairman Phil Glaize today urged Congress for immediate action on immigration reform in order to protect the future of American agriculture. The hearing, entitled “Protecting America´s Harvest,” also included testimony from Comedy Central´s Stephen Colbert and United Farm Workers President Arturo S. Rodriguez on this serious threat to America´s growers.

“Every harvest worker supports at least three full time jobs,” Glaize said. “Some are on the farm. More are off the farm, in related industries from equipment sales to box makers to food processing to truckers to port workers handling exports of high−value crops. Rural communities and rural economies depend on these jobs! But the jobs are tied to U.S. farm production, and if production moves to other nations, these jobs will, too. Their loss will be devastating and irreversible. This threat is not hypothetical, it is real, and worsening in the face of Congressional inaction.”

“The challenge we face is fundamentally about our food security as a nation. U.S. producers are steadily losing market share to imports of virtually all fruits and vegetables grown in the U.S., including fresh produce, but especially frozen and canned production and juices. Without a stable labor force we will soon see a day where we rely on foreign countries to feed us, much as we do for oil.”

“Our current immigration system is so badly broken that it is jeopardizing the future of my business and our industry,” Glaize told the Subcommittee. “Growers must weigh this uncertainty when making decisions about whether to expand, to pull out old trees and plant new varieties or pass along the family business to the next generation.”

“Congress and the President must address this problem now! We must stop politicizing this issue and instead keep in mind that farms and businesses, jobs, rural economies, and our national food security are on the line.”

A third generation family farm operation in Winchester, Virginia, Glaize Orchards operates 650 acres of orchard, along with a packing house and cold storage. Phil Glaize is a former Chairman of the U.S. Apple Association, the national trade association representing American apple growers, and a member of ACIR, one of the leading voices on immigration reform.

USApple and ACIR are active supporters of “AgJOBS” (S. 1038 and H.R. 2414), proposed legislation with broad bi−partisan support that would fix the existing dysfunctional H−2A agricultural worker program, and allow undocumented farm workers in the U.S. the chance to earn legal status by continuing to work in agriculture and meeting other strict conditions. Senators Diane Feinstein (D−Ca.) and Richard Lugar (R−In.) are principal co−sponsors in the Senate and Representatives Adam Putnam (R−Fla.) and Howard Berman (D−Ca.) are the bill´s chief sponsors in the House.

Also testifying at the hearing were United Farm Workers President Arturo S. Rodriguez and the Comedy Central Network´s Stephen Colbert of “The Colbert Report.” In July, Rodriguez appeared on a segment of “The Colbert Report” and a few weeks later, Colbert spent a day laboring at a farm in update New York − as part of the UFW´s national “Take Our Jobs” campaign. The campaign invited U.S. citizens and legal residents to replace hundreds of thousands of immigrant field laborers. Since the campaign launched in late June, more than three million people have visited the website, www.takeourjobs.com. Of those visitors, 8,600 have expressed an interest in seeking employment as farm workers, but only 14 have actually taken − and stayed in − the jobs.

The U.S. Apple Association (USApple) is the national trade association representing the apple industry. Members include 36 state and regional apple associations representing the 7,500 apple growers throughout the country, as well as more than 300 individual firms involved in the apple business. USApple´s mission is to help facilitate the profitable production and marketing of apples and apple products through advocacy efforts, crisis issues management, and nutrition research and promotion.

The Agriculture Coalition for Immigration Reform (ACIR) is the broad national coalition representing over 300 national, regional, and state organizations whose members produce fruit and vegetables, dairy, nursery and greenhouse crops, poultry, livestock, and Christmas trees.