Trump and onions

By Preston Ehrler
GOSHEN — The presidential election of 2016 hasn’t just divided family and friends. It’s also creating new tensions between employers and employees.
Such is the case here in the Black Dirt region where many farm owners voice their strong support for Donald Trump, while the workers they employ and rely on, many of whom could face deportation if Trump’s platform is put into motion, do not.
AJ Cavallaro and Sons in Goshen, a farming family in the area since 1908, is now run by brothers John and Sam Cavallaro and their sons. The Cavallaros own a 200-acre onion farm on Big Island Road in the Town of Goshen that also employs farm hands, some of whom have been there for decades.
Sam Cavallaro is an ardent Trump supporter and staunch advocate for tariffs that he believes will level the playing fields with countries like China, Mexico and Canada.
Cavallaro does not agree with every aspect of Trump’s platform, including Trump’s call for the rounding up of all undocumented workers in the country and returning them.
“They are important in any part of the country,” Cavallaro said. “Any produce you buy in a grocery store, some Mexican has had his hands on it. They are the hub of the industry. And in the last 20 years, no American kid has asked me for a job, let alone ask me how much I was paying. (The Mexicans) are the only people that want to work.”

‘Our problem is not the Mexicans’

According to Cavallaro, if his workforce was deported per Trump’s plan, he would have to cut his operation back to where it was 50 or 60 years ago, when it was a family operation.
“You could do it as a family and that’s it,” he said. “The food would be outrageous, price-wise. You probably could not even afford to go to the grocery store.”
The Mexicans,” Cavallaro added, “are doing the work the American people don’t want to do.”
But Cavallaro noted, as other area farmers have echoed, “I don’t think it would be very easy to take 11 million workers out of here.”
“Our problem is not the Mexicans,” Cavallaro said. “I have not seen a Mexican blow himself up yet. The problem is the other people. The Mexicans come here to work. They make good money and pay taxes and have Social Security taken out, but are they going to collect it?”

Cavallaro’s Mexican labor speaks out

Discussing Trump and his platform with Cavallaro’s Mexican workers during their lunch break, all replied in unison that the proposal to deport undocumented immigrants is absurd.
Sam Ramos, who has been in the United States for 16 years, said that Trump’s plan to deport undocumented workers would have a “negative effect on the American economy as immigrants are the backbone of the farming industry.”
Ramos’ sister, Flor, who also works at Cavallaro, added, “Trump is a racist.”
Throughout the group, the consensus was that Trump should be criticizing less and focusing on “things that matter, like jobs.”

Voting for Trump no matter what

Cavallaro emphasized that he does not always vote Republican. “I’m a Republican, but when John F. Kennedy ran, I voted for Kennedy. If I think the other party is better, I’m voting for him.”
But it would appear that in this election Cavallaro won’t be changing his mind: “He’s not what I call a politician. He is the American way. And I think we need somebody to shake up Washington. And somebody like Donald Trump who is a businessman, knows how to run a business. And this country is not being run like it’s supposed to be. All the politicians come in broke and they all leave millionaires.
“I’m voting for Trump.”
Desiree Lee contributed reporting to this story.