E-Verify, immigration must be linked
THE OLYMPIAN | • Published August 11, 2011

Skagit Valley strawberry grower Steve Sakuma doesn’t mince words when he talks about the unintended consequences of a bill introduced in Congress requiring employers to electronically verify the immigration status of their employees.

Based on his own candid assessment of his work force, 80 percent of his more than 200 seasonal laborers are illegal immigrants.

Sure, they show him paperwork that says they are here legally, but Sakuma and thousands of other farmers who rely on migrant labor to harvest their fruits and vegetables know better.

Send those migrant laborers back to where they came from and those crops would rot in the fields and in the orchards.

“They are here doing what other people won’t do,â€