There Is No Bigger Kitchen-Table Issue Than ICE Violence

Given their fixation on America’s dining rooms, it may help
Jeffries and Schumer understand the problem of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to put it all in their
favored kitchen-table terms. While there is no question crimes like the murder
of Renee Good and ICE’s mass deportation campaigns in Minneapolis-St. Paul,
Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Louisiana, and North Carolina are a
flagrant assault on human rights and American democracy, the agency’s
activities are also putting the squeeze on everyone’s pocketbooks. Not only are
ICE’s operations hiking up everyone’s grocery bills, they are also, contrary to
administration claims, making the housing crisis worse by terrorizing the
construction industry and making life unlivable in immigrant neighborhoods. 

When it comes to grocery bills, ICE’s raids have frozen
large swathes of American agriculture with chilling consequences for consumers
nationwide. The American Immigration Council estimated that, as of 2019, nearly
half of all farmworkers were immigrants and that 27.3 percent are
undocumented. These figures rise even higher when the question shifts to crop
production; there, immigrants make up 57 percent of the workforce, with
undocumented workers making up 36.4 percent of that total. The United States, in other words, depends on
immigrants to stay fed, ensure abundant supplies of food, and keep the costs of
grocery bills down.  

With these realities in mind, it is unsurprising that ICE’s
mass-deportation campaign has significantly disrupted food production. A Bay
Area Council–UC Merced study from June 2025 argued that expelling all
undocumented immigrants from California would shrink
the size of the state’s agricultural sector by 14 percent, putting a
serious crimp in
America’s most agriculturally productive state. But this damage is not limited
to the Golden State. Agricultural advocates were sounding the alarm as early as
April 2025 after the American Business Immigration Coalition determined that
mass deportation, nationwide, would
shrink agricultural output by between $30 billion and $60 billion and push many
farms to the breaking point.