Mistreating The Guests

George W. Bush's insistence on a new guest-worker program as part of any immigration reform has infuriated many conservatives, but it is also sounding alarm bells among some immigrant-rights advocates. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) argues that many guest workers already in the U.S. are being cruelly exploited--sometimes in government jobs--and fears that any expansion will lead to more instances of what Mary Bauer, an SPLC lawyer, calls "indentured servitude."

About 10,000 guest workers, mostly Mexican and Guatemalan, have temporary visas to plant trees and clear brush on private land or tracts owned by the U.S. Forest Service. Called pineros because many work in remote pine forests, the workers are recruited by private contractors with promises of high wages. But many pineros arrive in the U.S. as much as $2,000 in debt for travel and visa expenses--costs the courts have ruled must be borne by employers. "Often recruiters make them leave the deed to their home with a company representative as collateral to ensure they stay on the job," Bauer says. They routinely work 60-hr. weeks, are not paid federally mandated overtime and earn less than minimum wage.

Labor Department and Forest Service officials insist they are cracking down on unscrupulous employers and contractors. But critics like Congressman Joe Baca, a California Democrat, say they have not done enough. "If we're going to expand any kind of guest-worker program," Baca says, "we've got to make sure there's not this abuse."