{"id":1967,"date":"2011-05-30T08:59:50","date_gmt":"2011-05-30T12:59:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/05\/who-will-pick-vidalia-onions-now-that-immigrants-are-scared-away.html"},"modified":"2011-05-30T08:59:50","modified_gmt":"2011-05-30T12:59:50","slug":"who-will-pick-vidalia-onions-now-that-immigrants-are-scared-away","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/05\/who-will-pick-vidalia-onions-now-that-immigrants-are-scared-away.html","title":{"rendered":"Who will pick Vidalia onions now that immigrants are scared away?"},"content":{"rendered":"Could Georgia’s\n\nanti-immigration law<\/a> already have ill effects?\n

\nAP wrote May 20, 2011,\n\nImmigration crackdown worries Vidalia onion county<\/a>:\n

\n\n<\/a>\nSigns point to an exodus in Vidalia onion country. Fliers on a\nMexican storefront advertise free transportation for workers willing\nto pick jalapenos and banana peppers in Florida and blueberries in the\nCarolinas. Buying an outbound bus ticket now requires reservations.\n\nWhile most states rejected immigration crackdowns this year, conservative\nGeorgia and Utah are the only states where comprehensive bills have\npassed. With the ink barely dry on Georgia’s law, among the toughest\nin the country, the divisions between suburban voters and those in\nthe countryside are once again laid bare when it comes to immigration,\neven among people who line up on many other issues.\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nGuess who wanted this crackdown even though rural south Georgians didn’t:\n

\nThe crackdown proved popular in suburban Atlanta, where Spanish-only\nsigns proliferate and the Latino population has risen dramatically over\nthe past few decades. Residents complain that illegal immigrants take\ntheir jobs and strain public resources.\n<\/blockquote>\nThat’s right: Atlanta, not content with lusting after our water,\nnow scares off our workers.\n

\n\n<\/a>\nDo immigrants really take jobs from locals?\nSuch claims never seem to have data to back them up.\nI tend to agree with\n\nCarlos Santana<\/a>:\n

\n“This is about fear, that people are going to steal my job,” Santana said\nof the law. “No we ain\u2019t. You don\u2019t clean toilets and clean sheets,\nstop shucking and jiving.”\n<\/blockquote>\nIn south Georgia local people won’t pick Vidalia onions for the wages\nimmigrants will, and the wages locals want the farmers can’t afford.\n

\n\n<\/a>\nRemember who profits from this crackdown, at the expense of Georgia\nfarmers and taxpayers:\n\nprivate prison companies and their investors.<\/a>\n

\nWe don’t need a private prison in Lowndes County.\nSpend those tax dollars on education instead.\n

\n-jsq\n

\nPS: Vidalia onion story owed to Jane Osborn.\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Could Georgia’s anti-immigration law already have ill effects? AP wrote May 20, 2011, Immigration crackdown worries Vidalia onion county: Signs point to an exodus in Vidalia onion country. Fliers on a Mexican storefront advertise free transportation for workers willing to pick jalapenos and banana peppers in Florida and blueberries in the Carolinas. Buying an outbound […]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[97,202,48,40,14,15,321,2,19,1381,72],"tags":[4482,8817,2858,3864,8701,8709,8830,8730,727,7,4481,75,218,215,4480,8749],"class_list":["post-1967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-agriculture","category-code-enforcement","category-community","category-economy","category-education","category-food-and-drink","category-government","category-history","category-immigration","category-incarceration","tag-carlos-santana","tag-cca","tag-corrections-corporation-of-america","tag-fear","tag-georgia","tag-history","tag-immigration","tag-incarceration","tag-jail","tag-lowndes-county","tag-onion","tag-prison","tag-profit","tag-south-georgia","tag-vidalia","tag-vlcia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-vJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1967"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1967\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}