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    Trump Shifts Deportation Focus, Pausing Raids on Farms, Hotels and Eateries

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    The abrupt pivot on an issue at the heart of Mr. Trump’s presidency suggested his broad immigration crackdown was hurting industries and constituencies he does not want to lose.The Trump administration has abruptly shifted the focus of its mass deportation campaign, telling Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials to largely pause raids and arrests in the agricultural industry, hotels and restaurants, according to an internal email and three U.S. officials with knowledge of the guidance.The decision suggested that the scale of President Trump’s mass deportation campaign — an issue that is at the heart of his presidency — is hurting industries and constituencies that he does not want to lose.The new guidance comes after protests in Los Angeles against the Trump administration’s immigration raids, including at farms and businesses. It also came as Mr. Trump made a rare concession this week that his crackdown was hurting American farmers and hospitality businesses.The guidance was sent on Thursday in an email by a senior ICE official, Tatum King, to regional leaders of the ICE department that generally carries out criminal investigations, including work site operations, known as Homeland Security Investigations.“Effective today, please hold on all work site enforcement investigations/operations on agriculture (including aquaculture and meat packing plants), restaurants and operating hotels,” he wrote in the message.The email explained that investigations involving “human trafficking, money laundering, drug smuggling into these industries are OK.” But it said — crucially — that agents were not to make arrests of “non criminal collaterals,” a reference to people who are undocumented but who are not known to have committed any other crime.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Hits California Farms

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      Farmworkers hid in fields on Tuesday as word spread that ICE agents were conducting raids in California’s breadbasket, an activist said.As a community activist in California’s agricultural heartland, Hazel Davalos spends much of her day talking with migrant farm workers and volunteers. So as word spread Tuesday of immigration raids on the Central Coast and San Joaquin Valley, she heard accounts of some migrants hiding in the fields between rows of crops.Many could not leave the ranches where they work, said Ms. Davalos, executive director of Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy, and others worried about being detained on their commute home. She knows of 40 workers who were detained Tuesday in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, she said.A video published by ABC News showed federal agents chasing a farmworker through the fields Tuesday in Ventura County, northwest of Los Angeles. Raids were also conducted at farms in Kern and Tulare counties, according to Teresa Romero, president of the United Farm Workers union.A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson would not confirm that any of the reported raids took place, but said in a statement that work-site immigration enforcement “protects workers from exploitation and trafficking.”A crowd formed at the back gate of Ambiance Apparel in Los Angeles on Friday after federal immigration agents gathered at the company.Alex Welsh for The New York TimesThe Trump administration is ramping up its immigration crackdown, with a focus on workplaces with undocumented laborers, such as farms, restaurants and construction sites. Estimates show more than eight million undocumented immigrants work in the United States.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      RFK Jr. Is Criticized by Cesar Chavez’s Family Over His Chavez Day Event

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      A campaign event on Saturday intended to galvanize support among Latino voters and organized labor behind Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential bid instead drew condemnation from the family of the labor organizer Cesar Chavez, who accused Mr. Kennedy of exploiting the Chavez name for political gain.Mr. Kennedy’s campaign held a “celebration” of Chavez in Los Angeles ahead of March 31, Chavez’s birthday, which is recognized as an official holiday in California. The Kennedy family has a decades-long history of friendship and political partnership with the Chavez family, dating to Mr. Kennedy’s father, Robert F. Kennedy.But in a letter Friday addressed to the campaign, Chavez’s eldest son, Fernando Chavez, writing on behalf of the Chavez family, asked Mr. Kennedy to stop referring to his father or using images of him, and threatened legal action.“It causes us great pain to see your campaign repeatedly using our father’s images along with related documentary film and photographs of him to suggest the alignment of your campaign with the values of Cesar Chavez,” the letter said. “It is our sincere conviction that this association is untrue and deceptive.”In a statement Saturday, Mr. Kennedy said the event was intended “to honor Cesar Chavez and his close friendship with my father, my family and me, and his impact on our country.” In an interview Sunday, he said he had repeatedly reached out to members of the family in the weeks before the event, but heard nothing until reporters called on Friday about the letter, which he said the campaign never actually received. (The letter was emailed on Friday to the campaign’s press office address, a family spokesman said.)“Of course, if they had asked me, we would have done something else, very, very easily,” Mr. Kennedy said. “If people in the family had wanted us to cancel the event, it would have been quite easy for them to pick up the phone.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More