Judge orders Labor Department to rewrite farmworker wage rule after finding it unlawful

A federal judge in California struck down a Trump administration rule that cut wages for farmworkers holding H-2A guestworker visas, ruling the change was “arbitrary and capricious” and adopted without the legally required public comment period.

U.S. District Judge Kirk Sherriff of the Eastern District of California, sitting in Fresno, issued the August 26 ruling in a lawsuit brought by the United Farm Workers, the UFW Foundation and 18 individual farmworkers, according to Capital Press. The suit challenged an October 2025 Department of Labor rule that changed how the Adverse Effect Wage Rate, the minimum hourly pay floor for H-2A workers, is calculated, and separately let employers deduct housing costs from workers’ paychecks.

The Labor Department had projected the October 2025 rule would save farm employers roughly $2.5 billion a year, Capital Press reported. In Washington state, the change dropped the applicable wage from $19.82 an hour in 2024 to $17.13 an hour once the housing deduction was applied, according to the outlet. The UFW Foundation estimated the rule cut wages nationally by $5 to $7 an hour, close to a 15% reduction, according to FreshFruitPortal.

Judge Sherriff ordered the Labor Department to develop a new wage-setting methodology within two weeks of the ruling and found the decision should apply retroactively, meaning employers may owe back pay to both H-2A workers and U.S. farmworkers paid under the invalidated rate, FreshFruitPortal reported.

UFW President Teresa Romero said in a statement carried by Capital Press: “This decision recognizes the important and essential work of the men and women who put food on our tables.” Romero added that “employers must be held accountable for paying back any difference between the new legal wage and the illegal wage rates still in effect.” In a separate statement reported by DTN Progressive Farmer, Romero said the union was “pleased the court found the wage cuts, which were as much as $7 an hour in some states, were illegal.”

Judge Sherriff found that the Labor Department “rushed through its rulemaking process and lacked justification to skip public notice-and-comment periods for most of the changes in the rule,” according to DTN Progressive Farmer.

As of three quarters through the current fiscal year, the Labor Department had certified just under 350,000 H-2A positions across more than 30,600 farms nationally, DTN Progressive Farmer reported. Georgia, Florida, Washington, California and North Carolina together account for nearly half of all H-2A jobs, and H-2A hiring has roughly quadrupled over the past decade, according to the outlet.

Farm employer groups criticized the ruling. National Council of Agricultural Employers President John Hollay said the decision “reignites” a worker crisis and that “America’s farmers, ranchers, and growers have been pushed toward a breaking point by artificially inflated wage mandates,” DTN Progressive Farmer reported. The National Council of Farmer Cooperatives and the International Fresh Produce Association separately warned the ruling creates “renewed uncertainty for growers already facing significant workforce and cost pressures,” according to the outlet.

The Department of Labor responded on September 2 with updated Adverse Effect Wage Rates, according to VisaVerge’s Visa Update. The new national rates set Skill Level I pay at $12.31 an hour, a 3.5% increase, and Skill Level II pay at $16.07 an hour, a 2.1% increase. Kansas saw the largest single-state jump, with Skill Level I wages rising 21.3%, while Louisiana’s Skill Level I rate rose 10.9%, or roughly 90 cents an hour.

The new rates took effect on a two-tier schedule tied to a separate case, State of Kansas v. Department of Labor, Visa Update reported. States not covered by the Kansas court’s injunction saw the new rates apply starting August 3, while 17 states named in that injunction, including Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia, did not see the updated rates take effect until August 17.