On June 10, 2025, agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided Glenn Valley Foods, a small meatpacking plant in Omaha, Nebraska, arresting 76 workers with fraudulent paperwork. The raid—the largest in Nebraska since President Trump took office in January—sent shockwaves throughout the agricultural sector.
Undocumented workers make up a significant percentage of the agricultural workforce, estimated at around 40%. In the meatpacking industry, the numbers may be even higher—up to 50% of workers may not be in the United States legally. Omaha is home to a number of meatpacking plants, including one operated by multinational giant JBS, but for undisclosed reasons only Glenn Valley Foods was targeted in this raid.
Glenn Valley Foods founder, Gary Rohwer, told reporters that he was shocked by the raid because he had been in full compliance with federal employment regulations. The company used the Department of Homeland Security’s online E-Verify system to check applicants’ eligibility to work in the United States. The system cannot detect cases of identity fraud where the social security number provided by an applicant actually belongs to someone else.
Chad Hartmann, president of Glenn Valley Foods, said that DHS told him that E-Verify was “flawed and easy to cheat.” But, with no better alternative, the company is continuing to use the system to screen the new employees they are hiring to replace those arrested in the raid.
Hispanic workers across the agricultural sector—even those who are employed legally—have been traumatized by these raids, fearing they may be ICE’s next target. Some have been afraid to show up to work after ICE raided several farms in Ventura County, California and one dairy farm in New Mexico.
A few days after the Omaha raid, President Trump told ICE to pause raids in the agricultural and hospitality industries due to their economic impact. But by June 16, ICE officials reversed the directive, saying that they would not be able to meet their quota of 3000 arrests per day “without raids at the businesses that had been exempted.” This leaves the agricultural industry and farmworkers in a state of confusion and concern.
Seasonal agricultural operations—especially fruit and vegetable farms—can legally hire guest workers using the H-2A visa program. But employers that require year-round, steady work—like dairy farms and meatpacking plants—cannot use the H-2A program, hence the high percentage of undocumented workers hired (often unknowingly) by these industries, who are advocating for an expansion of the H-2A program to allow unskilled laborers from other countries to work legally in the US year-round.
Immigration reform is an extremely complex issue—which is why it has been such a persistent problem throughout multiple presidential administrations. But eco-ag farmers can concur with the conventional farm sector that we need a better way to allow farmworkers from other countries to work legally in the agricultural sector, so that there is no incentive for them to take the dangerous route of entering and working illegally.
