By David Bacon, American
Prospect
August 9, 2017
Risking deportation, Washington
state farmworkers protest dangerous conditions in the fields.
A farmworker’s death in the
broiling fields of Washington state has prompted his fellow braceros to put
their livelihoods in jeopardy by going on strike, joining a union, being
discharged—and risking deportation.
Honesto Silva Ibarra died in
Harborview hospital in Seattle on Sunday night, August 6. Silva, a married father of three, was a
guest worker—in Spanish, a “contratado”—brought to the United States under the
H-2A visa program, to work in the fields.
Miguel Angel Ramirez Salazar,
another contratado, says Silva went to his supervisor at Sarbanand Farms last
week, complaining that he was sick and couldn’t work. “They said if he didn’t
keep working, he’d be fired for ‘abandoning work.’ But after a while he
couldn’t work at all.”
Silva finally went to the
Bellingham Clinic, about an hour south of the farm where he was working, in
Sumas, close to the Canadian border. By then it was too late, however. He was
sent to Harborview, where he collapsed and died.[…]
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| Photo: David Bacon |
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