Tied farmworkers in free markets: congressional hearing debates on the roles of market and state from 1995 to 2012

Within the larger immigration reform debate in the U.S., the nature of guestworker policies and the fate of undocumented farmworkers have occupied Congressional attention for over two decades. Farm employers have repeatedly come before Congress to seek change in the H-2A Temporary Agricultural Program; actors also debate the conditions or existence of a path to legalization for undocumented farmworkers. This article analyses transcripts of hearings in the U.S. Congress on these issues and connections between frames speakers utilize and the role of the state in labour supply and demand in the agriculture sector. Policy actors deploy free market frames to advance policies that actually reflect state roles in constructing markets rather than interference-free competition. Their discourse reveals that, as H-2A and immigration enforcement affects labour supply, policy changes expectations of employers and some Members of Congress for the labour market. They seek policies to respond not only to “labor shortages,” but to specific worker characteristics they seek in a labour force. This constructed labour demand is reflected in themes of ties to work, who will or will not take and perform well in farm jobs, and experience.