The last time Antonio followed a hurricane to Florida, authorities detained him at a day-labor stand and sent the construction worker back to his native Mexico. After nearly 20 years in this country, he accepted the order to leave. He wanted to see his aging parents.
But he returned to the state days after Hurricane Ian, sleeping in his pickup truck in a discount store parking lot. Glancing at the street, waiting for someone to roll up and offer him work, he said he was anxious because Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has declared that undocumented immigrants are unwelcome in Florida.
“We’re not here to steal; we’re here to work,” said Antonio, 48, standing beside his truck in a hard-hit city in Southwest Florida. “This is helping.”
Florida’s governor upended the national debate over the record number of arrests on the southern border by flying newly arrived migrants last month to liberal-leaning Massachusetts, ostensibly to prevent them from burdening his state with the cost of their education and health care. But after Hurricane Ian inflicted billions of dollars in damage, undocumented workers came to the Sunshine State to rebuild, joining tens of thousands of others who were already here — and who construction managers say are sorely needed.
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Their arrival puts the Republican strongholds that weathered the worst of the storm in an awkward position as they attempt to recover: With low unemployment, a shortage of construction workers and an above-average elderly population, can Florida rebuild without them?
“We’d like them back,” Nancy Randall, a real estate agent who declined to give her age or political affiliation, said of the immigrants DeSantis had flown to Martha’s Vineyard, after Ian drove four feet of water into her green-shuttered home in Naples, soaking her grandmother’s rocking chair and everything else. “We need all the helpers we can get.”
DeSantis’s office did not respond to questions about the undocumented workers arriving to clean up, but he has promised that more migrant flights will come despite a Treasury Department inspector general investigation into the government money that paid for them.
Federal watchdog probes whether covid aid enabled Florida’s migrant flights
Construction is one of the biggest employers of undocumented immigrants, with 1.4 million workers across the country filling more than 1 in 10 jobs, researchers say. Nationwide, undocumented immigrants account for 23 percent of construction laborers, 38 percent of drywallers and 32 percent of roofers, according to a report by the nonprofit Center for American Progress last year.
Texas, where Gov. Greg Abbott (R) is paying to bus recent border crossers to predominantly Democratic states and the District of Columbia, has the highest number, some 311,000 construction workers, according to the most recent available data from the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute. Florida had more than 100,000 undocumented construction workers before Ian hit.
Undocumented immigrants also dominate a nomadic new workforce that is chasing violent storms fueled by climate change, accounting for the vast majority of the day laborers who cleaned up after Hurricane Harvey in 2017 and Hurricane Ida last year, according to the National Day Laborer Organizing Network.
“What has emerged is a transient workforce like farmworkers of yesteryear,” said Saket Soni, executive director of Resilience Force, a nonprofit that has helped hundreds of undocumented workers on the ground since Ian. “They follow storm after storm, city after city.”
Around Southwest Florida, drivers in pickup trucks and big white vans arrive before dawn to collect workers from sidewalks and parking lots. They offer work demolishing storm-damaged buildings on wealthy Sanibel Island and tarping roofs in Fort Myers. Other laborers are hired to rip up soggy floors in places like Bonita Springs. Some pay $7 an hour. Others $200 a day.
Immigrant workers interviewed in hurricane-ravaged communities said their phones lit up with offers after Ian demolished restaurants, damaged resorts and flooded bungalows up and down the sugar-sand coastline of western Florida. Recruiters even showed up in New York, advocates said, to hire Venezuelans who had been bused there by Republican governors.
Moises Calix, a 55-year-old from Honduras who lives in New Orleans, packed tools in his Chevy and made a beeline for Florida with his three sons and two pals after an acquaintance invited him to come help tarp roofs. They ate meals from gas stations and slept in the truck, emblazoned with an American flag to blend in.
“They told me there’s work here,” said Moises, who also worked after Katrina and said he’s been paid. “We’re working. You can earn money.”
But even with ample work, frustration is mounting. Across the parking lot, a dejected group of Hondurans said a man named “Carlos” had called them promising crew chief Fernando Jimenez $600 and his workers $400 each for two days of construction work. After they drove in from Austin, he offered them $100 each. They quit.
“You’re risking your life for $100 without security,” said Jimenez, 45, who has a green card. His friends are undocumented.
The scenes of exasperation echoed along the coast, spurring complaints that the Biden administration is acting too slowly to expand protections for immigrant workers. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued a memo a year ago allowing undocumented workers, in any industry, to apply for work permits and protection from being deported if they file complaints about labor violations with government agencies or are caught up in worksite investigations.
Just over two dozen permits have been approved, and more are pending, according to DHS, out of a nationwide workforce of approximately 7 million.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) and other Democrats urged DHS last month to issue “clear” guidance so that more will apply. “We’re not seeing utilization of the program in the way that we need to see it,” she said in an interview.
Federal law prohibits knowingly employing workers in the country illegally, but historically the federal government has been far more likely to deport immigrants than to punish the companies that hire them.
Resilience Force is one of the few visible supporters on the ground for immigrants. Team members visit day-labor stands to register workers, offer them membership cards, and negotiate with federal and local officials to improve their working conditions. And sometimes staff members confront construction bosses who allegedly put immigrants to work and then refuse to pay them.
But he returned to the state days after Hurricane Ian, sleeping in his pickup truck in a discount store parking lot. Glancing at the street, waiting for someone to roll up and offer him work, he said he was anxious because Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has declared that undocumented immigrants are unwelcome in Florida.
“We’re not here to steal; we’re here to work,” said Antonio, 48, standing beside his truck in a hard-hit city in Southwest Florida. “This is helping.”
Florida’s governor upended the national debate over the record number of arrests on the southern border by flying newly arrived migrants last month to liberal-leaning Massachusetts, ostensibly to prevent them from burdening his state with the cost of their education and health care. But after Hurricane Ian inflicted billions of dollars in damage, undocumented workers came to the Sunshine State to rebuild, joining tens of thousands of others who were already here — and who construction managers say are sorely needed.
ADVERTISING
Their arrival puts the Republican strongholds that weathered the worst of the storm in an awkward position as they attempt to recover: With low unemployment, a shortage of construction workers and an above-average elderly population, can Florida rebuild without them?
“We’d like them back,” Nancy Randall, a real estate agent who declined to give her age or political affiliation, said of the immigrants DeSantis had flown to Martha’s Vineyard, after Ian drove four feet of water into her green-shuttered home in Naples, soaking her grandmother’s rocking chair and everything else. “We need all the helpers we can get.”
DeSantis’s office did not respond to questions about the undocumented workers arriving to clean up, but he has promised that more migrant flights will come despite a Treasury Department inspector general investigation into the government money that paid for them.
Federal watchdog probes whether covid aid enabled Florida’s migrant flights
Construction is one of the biggest employers of undocumented immigrants, with 1.4 million workers across the country filling more than 1 in 10 jobs, researchers say. Nationwide, undocumented immigrants account for 23 percent of construction laborers, 38 percent of drywallers and 32 percent of roofers, according to a report by the nonprofit Center for American Progress last year.
Texas, where Gov. Greg Abbott (R) is paying to bus recent border crossers to predominantly Democratic states and the District of Columbia, has the highest number, some 311,000 construction workers, according to the most recent available data from the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute. Florida had more than 100,000 undocumented construction workers before Ian hit.
Undocumented immigrants also dominate a nomadic new workforce that is chasing violent storms fueled by climate change, accounting for the vast majority of the day laborers who cleaned up after Hurricane Harvey in 2017 and Hurricane Ida last year, according to the National Day Laborer Organizing Network.
“What has emerged is a transient workforce like farmworkers of yesteryear,” said Saket Soni, executive director of Resilience Force, a nonprofit that has helped hundreds of undocumented workers on the ground since Ian. “They follow storm after storm, city after city.”
‘I have to take care of my family’
Around Southwest Florida, drivers in pickup trucks and big white vans arrive before dawn to collect workers from sidewalks and parking lots. They offer work demolishing storm-damaged buildings on wealthy Sanibel Island and tarping roofs in Fort Myers. Other laborers are hired to rip up soggy floors in places like Bonita Springs. Some pay $7 an hour. Others $200 a day.
Immigrant workers interviewed in hurricane-ravaged communities said their phones lit up with offers after Ian demolished restaurants, damaged resorts and flooded bungalows up and down the sugar-sand coastline of western Florida. Recruiters even showed up in New York, advocates said, to hire Venezuelans who had been bused there by Republican governors.
Moises Calix, a 55-year-old from Honduras who lives in New Orleans, packed tools in his Chevy and made a beeline for Florida with his three sons and two pals after an acquaintance invited him to come help tarp roofs. They ate meals from gas stations and slept in the truck, emblazoned with an American flag to blend in.
“They told me there’s work here,” said Moises, who also worked after Katrina and said he’s been paid. “We’re working. You can earn money.”
But even with ample work, frustration is mounting. Across the parking lot, a dejected group of Hondurans said a man named “Carlos” had called them promising crew chief Fernando Jimenez $600 and his workers $400 each for two days of construction work. After they drove in from Austin, he offered them $100 each. They quit.
“You’re risking your life for $100 without security,” said Jimenez, 45, who has a green card. His friends are undocumented.
The scenes of exasperation echoed along the coast, spurring complaints that the Biden administration is acting too slowly to expand protections for immigrant workers. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued a memo a year ago allowing undocumented workers, in any industry, to apply for work permits and protection from being deported if they file complaints about labor violations with government agencies or are caught up in worksite investigations.
Just over two dozen permits have been approved, and more are pending, according to DHS, out of a nationwide workforce of approximately 7 million.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) and other Democrats urged DHS last month to issue “clear” guidance so that more will apply. “We’re not seeing utilization of the program in the way that we need to see it,” she said in an interview.
Federal law prohibits knowingly employing workers in the country illegally, but historically the federal government has been far more likely to deport immigrants than to punish the companies that hire them.
Resilience Force is one of the few visible supporters on the ground for immigrants. Team members visit day-labor stands to register workers, offer them membership cards, and negotiate with federal and local officials to improve their working conditions. And sometimes staff members confront construction bosses who allegedly put immigrants to work and then refuse to pay them.
