Talk to any farm group across the country, and they will tell you that the agricultural labor shortage is one of the most limiting factors in the industry right now next to low grain profitability.
The Time is Now
The debate over immigration and ag labor reform has been a political hot potato for decades, which has led to inaction by Congress. However, there are some indications from the leadership of the Senate and House Agriculture Committees that 2026 might be the year a long- or short-term fix could finally be passed.
The chairs and ranking members of both committees joined American Farm Bureau president Zippy Duvall at their annual convention in Anaheim, Calif., this week to talk about a variety of ag topics, but the focus quickly turned to ag labor. There was consensus among all four that solving this crisis was a priority for 2026.
Senate Ag Committee Leadership Making Ag Labor a Priority
Senate Ag Ranking Member Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., says the H-2A program is not working and there is pressure to find a solution.
“And I just think the time has come to get this done,” she says. “Michael Bennett has a bill that I am a co-sponsor of that would fix the H-2A visa program and make sure that we have year-round visas, that we are doing something on wage certainty protecting the existing workforce.”
Klobuchar says she has worked on immigration and agricultural labor reform over the course of several administrations, only to hit a brick wall in the end. However, she believes the need has become too great in the U.S. among industries like agriculture to ignore. To get this across the finish line farm groups like the American Farm Bureau will need to appeal to lawmakers about how refusing to solve this crisis could put more farmers out of business.
“You’ve got to make that economic case about how we want to feed the world,” she says. “We want to have strong businesses, and to do that we need a smart immigration system that allows for workers.”
Why is 2026 Different?
One change that has improved the political climate is the Trump administration’s beefed up efforts to protect the U.S. southern border says Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman John Boozman, R-Ark.
“We said we could not do reform because the border was not secure, and it wasn’t secure; it was just the opposite of that,” he says. “We’ve worked hard; it is secure now, then through Visa programs you control the flow, but it’s time to do that.”
Boozman adds that another important change is the consensus in agriculture about the importance of reforming immigration and ag labor.
“Every farm group I talk to say this is a top priority,” he says. “We need massive reform, and the good news is on both sides of the aisle, I think, that we are getting that message because of your hard work lobbying.”
House Ag Committee Leadership Has Already Laid the Groundwork
House Agriculture Committee Chair G.T. Thompson, R-Pa., agrees it is time to break the grid lock on ag labor reform in place since the 1980s.
“Because if you don’t have a work force you have food insecurity; if you have food insecurity you have national insecurity,” he says.
In the 118th Congress Thompson laid the groundwork for legislation by assembling a 16-member bipartisan task force on ag labor that included a cross section of farmers and processors. He says the result was a thoughtful action plan that provided 21 recommendations for reform.
“Fifteen of those were unanimous, and so we have taken those to legislative council,” he says. “We’d probably be a little further ahead if we didn’t have that goofy shutdown. We are looking forward here in this first quarter of this year of getting that introduced.”
House Agriculture Committee Ranking Member Angie Craig, D-Minn., says it’s a good first step but warns the challenge for immigration reform is the ongoing ICE actions carried out by Homeland Security. She had heard from dairy farmers in her home state about the chilling effect its having on the work force.
“Whether they were legal immigrants or not, they don’t want to come to work because they fear this environment right now,” she says.
Craig says at times the administration has given the impression that they do not want immigrant labor in the U.S., and so that needs to change to be able to build enough support in Congress to pass this legislation.