Supreme Court takes up appeal from Trump administration over living conditions for migrant farmworkers
By John Fritze, CNN
(CNN) — The Supreme Court agreed Monday to decide whether the US Department of Labor is empowered to enforce working conditions for foreign farm laborers, delving into an immigration program that the Trump administration is attempting to expand.
At the center of the case is a dispute between a New Jersey farm that hired about 96 foreign workers to help harvest peppers and asparagus in 2015 and the Department of Labor, which claims the farm failed to meet basic working conditions such as consistent access to drinking water, clean bathrooms and a kitchen to prepare meals.
The farm workers were hired under the H-2A visa program, which brings in hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals each year to work in agriculture on a temporary basis. The administration recently moved to lower wages for that program, a boon to farmers who are facing labor shortages — a longstanding problem that has been aggravated by the administration’s crackdown on both legal and illegal immigration.
After an inspection at Sun Valley Orchards in rural New Jersey, the department levied more than $212,000 in civil penalties and nearly $370,000 in back wages. But a federal appeals court ruled that the farm was entitled to have its case decided first by a federal court, rather than an administrative law judge at the Labor Department.
In siding with the farm, the Philadelphia-based 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals relied on a 2024 Supreme Court decision that held a hedge fund manager and former conservative radio show host was entitled to a jury trial over securities fraud allegations rather than an in-house review by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“Sun Valley was forced to endure years of unconstitutional proceedings in agency courts,” the farm’s attorneys told the Supreme Court.
The ability of federal agencies to levy fines and then review those determinations with in-house judicial bodies has been heavily debated in recent years. Earlier this month, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in another case touching on similar questions at the Federal Communications Commission.
In the farm case, the Trump administration has argued that the Department of Labor action is carved out of the Supreme Court’s earlier precedent.
The workers’ shifts at Sun Valley lasted for 12 hours a day, with only a one-hour break, according to the Justice Department. The farm provided six bedrooms for the workers, with 20 bunk beds in each room, according to the government. Though the farm’s job posting offered “free cooking and kitchen facilities,” the Justice Department said that instead of having access to a kitchen, a supervisor used the space to sell beer and soft drinks to the workers.
After Sun Valley lost the bulk of its appeal at the Labor Department, it sued in federal court, claiming in part the agency adjudication violated separation of powers principles.
The district court sided with the government, dismissing the case, but the 3rd Circuit reversed that decision. Trump officials appealed to the Supreme Court in February.
“By one estimate, H-2A workers account for a sixth of the United States’ agricultural workforce,” the Justice Department told the Supreme Court in its appeal. The appeals court decision, it said, “deprives the government of an important tool for ensuring that employers comply with the conditions for employing those workers.”
The Supreme Court will likely hear arguments later this year and hand down a decision in mid-2027.
The-CNN-Wire
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