Tucson Rep. Adelita Grijalva has introduced a bill that would make it mandatory to compensate agricultural workers for overtime pay across the United States.
The Fairness for Farm Workers Act, the federal bill introduced by Grijalva, D-Ariz., and Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., is on its fifth run in Congress. It was first introduced by then-Sen. Kamala Harris and Grijalva's late father, Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva, in 2018.
Farm workers were excluded from two major labor protections 88 years ago when the Fair Labor Standards Act was enacted: minimum wage protections and overtime pay. In 1966, Congress extended minimum wage coverage for some (excluding immediate family members of farm owners and some small farms) but no changes have been made to overtime pay exclusions.
“This bill is fundamentally about fairness — ensuring that the workers who keep America fed receive the same workplace protections and benefits as any other worker,” said Grijalva in a statement.
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Few states have passed laws that extend overtime protections for agricultural workers. Arizona is not one of them.
California and Washington require employers to pay overtime compensation after 40 hrs per week. Hawaii, Maryland, New York and Oregon have set the threshold between 48 and 60 hours a week. Colorado passed an overtime pay for farm work in 2021; this year it had competing bills to either reduce or bump up the overtime threshold.
In late 2025, the Trump administration authorized contractors and agricultural employers to slash the wages of seasonal farmworkers coming to work under a visa program known as H-2A.
The measure imposed cuts of $3-$7 an hour, depending on the state. In Arizona, cuts were of to $3.72, which placed pay for harvest work only 17 cents above minimum wage. Employers and contractors could make an additional deduction of $2 per hour for the migrant worker's housing costs, which would leave the final minimum salary at $13.32 an hour.
“It’s shameful for this administration to try to undercut farm worker wages in order to address a labor shortage of its own making through its cruel immigration agenda,” said Grijalva in response to the changes to H-2A worker salaries.
A judge in California ruled in late August that the Trump administration illegally lowered migrant farmworkers wages. He ordered the Labor Department to introduce new wages through formal process and inform employers that they may owe back wages, The Washington Post reported. The ruling was the result of a lawsuit filed last year by 18 U.S. farm workers and the United Farm Workers and UFW Foundation.
Tucson Rep. Adelita Grijalva's bill aims to provide overtime pay for agricultural workers nationwide.
How changes in overtime pay affect Arizona
Arizona is subject to federal overtime law that excludes farmworkers from these benefits.
If the Fairness for Farm Workers Act were ennacted, it would become the new standard across the country. However, previous versions of the bill had stalled in the committee, never making it to the floor final votes.
All agricultural workers would be entitled to be paid overtime, at one and a half times their regular rate. The bill phases the overtime threshold for agricultural workers over a number of years. It would start with 55 hours per week in 2027 and reach 40 hours per week in 2030. It would give smaller employers until 2033 to adopt the changes.
Alejandro Pacheco has worked in farm fields for nearly three decades. Like many residents of Mexicalli, Baja California, or from San Luis Rio Colorado, Sonora, he crosses the U.S-Mexico port of entry daily during the winter months to work in the lettuce and vegetable fields of the greater Yuma region.
Most of the farm workers in Arizona's "Salad Bowl Capital" have green cards or dual Mexican-American citizenship. But there has been an ever-growing number of workers that are hired from all corners of Mexico and other foreign countries under H-2A visas.
Sometimes there isn't enough work, said Pacheco, 64, who does thinning work in the lettuce fields and also joins the watermelon, lettuce and broccoli harvest. In summer months, workers are lucky if they get more than five hours of work per day.
This year growers were devastated by pest infestations and workers barely clocked four days a week, a friend of Pacheco claimed. In the winter, they regularly work seven to eight hours or more, he said, but daily border crossers like him are always on the look for work.
"Jobs are scarce," Pacheco said.
With the increase in H-2A workers during the busiest months and the implementation of automated machines for thinning and weeding, many have to turn back and go home depending on the day. H-2A workers have contracts, but many domestic workers don't have written job offers or protection for the harvest season. They can leave the job when they please or be fired, a double-edged sword. Long waits for border crossing, more attractive job offers, or an unemployment check often result in no-shows the busiest season is a constant struggle, and H-2A workers provide the security growers need to get their product to market. The Arizona Farm Bureau supports making changes to the H-2A program that would allow migrant workers to stay year-round. Labor unions say the program needs reform to prevent labor abuses and discrimination of domestic workers
Chad Smith, director of government relations with the Arizona Farm Bureau, said he was "disappointed" that Grijalva didn't reach out for a conversation, and the legislation as introduced is "a hard no" for them.
"Operators and farmers are running on very thin margins as it is, and so you can only put so much input costs into those operations before they go out of business," Smith said. Arizona producers are competing not only with other states but with international produce that has lower input costs and regulations, he added.
"Agriculture and the crops don't operate on a 40-hour work week," he said. "And so to dictate a rigid kind of overtime requirement doesn't account for all of those realities."
Work conditions in the fields are undeniably tough. Aside from waking up near midnight to cross the U.S. port of entry and then riding a bus up to 1.5 hours to the fields, work crews have very fast-paced work under extreme temperatures. Supervisors' pressure and treatment of workers can vary greatly depending on the company hiring to do harvesting, Pacheco, the farm worker from Mexicalli, told The Republic.
Many crews never get to work, or are paid, even six or seven hours per day because supervisors pressure them to get the work done faster and clean entire fields in less time, he said.
"They don't let you stop for a water break. And one doesn't want to fall behind."
