Tens of thousands of California’s guest farmworkers and U.S. farmworkers will see pay increases in 2022, which advocates say comes thanks to their lawsuit to stop a Trump-era wage freeze.

The wage increase is based on the USDA’s annual survey findings on farm labor, released on Nov. 24. The survey and its findings are used to determine the rate of pay for temporary, seasonal agricultural workers employed through the H-2A program.

The wage increase was in jeopardy because of a wage freeze proposed under former President Donald Trump that aimed to help farmers, many of whom lost profit and laid fallow their land due to the impact of the shutdowns in early 2020. Farmworker advocates sued the Department of Agriculture over the proposed wage freeze and secured an injunction to stop the ruling.

The ruling would have locked in the 2019 minimum wage employers must pay foreign agricultural workers with H-2A visas and was estimated to save farmers and growers an estimated $1.6 billion in labor costs over 10 years.

Advocates said that the wage freeze was unfair since farmworkers, who were officially declared essential workers during the pandemic, were putting their lives on the line to work. Growers say the wage freeze was essential to keep farms operating and grocery stores stalked as the pandemic shutdowns disrupted the food supply chain.

Read the full article about farmworker wages by Melissa Montalvo at CalMatters.