Overview:
Because the Trump administration intensifies immigration enforcement, inland cities like Greeley, Colo. — depending on immigrant labor for meatpacking and retail sectors to maintain itself — show a widening hole between federal coverage and financial actuality.
Editor’s Be aware: This story is a part of a collection taking a look at Haitians in Greeley, Colorado — an organization city with a burgeoning immigrant inhabitants — as shifting immigration, financial and geopolitical forces meet. It’s supported by URL Collective. That is the primary installment.
GREELEY, Colo. — When Dracula Pierre, a Port-au-Prince native, first arrived on this fast-growing city about an hour north of Denver, he landed proper on time for work. After years of toiling within the Dominican Republic, he promptly adopted mates and kinfolk working on the native JBS USA meatpacking plant — the $38 billion firm that’s the world’s largest beef producer— and has labored there as a meat processor ever since.
Standing in entrance of his condo complicated in Greeley’s westside, Pierre, 28, defined how determined employers had been again then, in 2023. Former President Joe Biden was in workplace, centered on serving to the financial system get well from the pandemic and hundreds of Haitians migrating instantly from Haiti and Latin America made it to the USA — able to work.
“They had been begging my brother to persuade individuals he is aware of to come back,” mentioned Pierre, who turned licensed to stay and work legally via the Momentary Protected Standing (TPS) for Haiti program.
“They’d a whole bunch of open positions,” he mentioned. “I used to be employed the identical day.”
Now, President Donald J. Trump is loudly calling for immigrants like Pierre to be deported en masse. However, the younger employee has quietly continued together with his day by day actions. Like the remainder of the city, he’s watching what federal insurance policies might portend, however with out the chaos and worry seen and felt in Minneapolis and different cities.
In the course of the weeks main as much as Feb. 3, when the Division of Homeland Safety sought to finish TPS for greater than 350,000 Haitians, immigrant staff like Pierre, their employers and different Greeley residents carefully adopted the developments. They watched not via the lens of ideology, however of survival — recalling how a earlier deportation effort almost decimated Greeley.
In spite of everything, between 80% to 90% of meatpacking staff in Greeley are foreign-born, an area union chief instructed High Country News in September 2025. At present, new hires at JBS are largely Haitian and Beninese, union representatives say, and about 1,000 Haitians work on the plant.
(L-R) Dracula Pierre, a Haitian immigrant residing and dealing in Greeley, CO. Greeley Metropolis Corridor. A view of cattle in Greeley, CO. Photographs by Fred Cayemitte / The Haitian Instances
“Donald Trump’s insurance policies of chasing away immigrants don’t match the wants of enterprise and for jobs on this area, particularly not in Greeley,” he defined. “Individuals know these locations can’t survive with out immigrants.”
“The hardline stance from Washington is generally political theater,” Pierre added.
A sociologist and teacher at Aims Community College, who requested to not be named for security causes, concurred. The researcher mentioned as federal coverage tightens migration, cities like Greeley are left managing a well-known contradiction: an financial system depending on immigrant labor, and a nationwide agenda more and more decided to push these staff out.
“The distinction between Washington’s enforcement posture and native wants is stark,” mentioned the sociologist.
“Whereas Trump vilified immigrants throughout his 2024 presidential marketing campaign,” the sociologist defined, “cities throughout the Midwest relied on them to maintain their economies working.”
Economic system (re)constructed on immigrant labor
Immigrant labor has turn out to be indispensable throughout the northern Colorado plains, east of the Rocky Mountains. Meatpacking crops operated by trade giants— the 134,000-square-foot JBS company facility in Greeley and Cargill in close by Fort Morgan— anchor the regional financial system. Collectively, they’ve lured hundreds of staff from Haiti, Central America and Africa to fill physically-demanding jobs that few longtime residents are keen to take. In 2021, because the nation struggled to get well from the pandemic, the U.S. Division of Labor says it issued greater than 20,000 non permanent work visas to meat trade staff.
Haitians make up roughly 1,000 of the present workforce on the JBS plant, in accordance with a Farm Progress report in March 2025. The corporate disputed that quantity, nonetheless, saying it doesn’t monitor staff’ nationalities.
Metropolis officers didn’t return messages from The Haitian Instances looking for information and different details about its Haitian inhabitants for this text. However in addition they routinely check with financial objectives that require immigrant arms.
In a March 2025 State of the City deal with, for instance, officers celebrated the city’s development, highlighting infrastructure tasks geared toward increasing companies and providers. Later that yr, in November, Mayor Dale Corridor hinted at that reliance on “all individuals” throughout his November victory speech.
“I imagine that Greeley is ripe for robust, constructive financial and business-friendly situations that may assist all individuals of their skill to stay, work and play in the neighborhood,” he mentioned.
What metropolis leaders didn’t explicitly say is that not one of the tasks — from development to service enlargement — could be attainable with out a regular workforce, largely composed of immigrants.
However conscious of it, they’re, after experiencing this collision between immigration enforcement and financial dependence earlier than.
Previous raids solely led to extra immigrants
Greeley’s financial system is constructed round cattle, in accordance with a Excessive Nation Information report, supplying greater than 2.5 million head that find yourself on grocery store cabinets and dinner tables across the nation. JBS’ Greeley plant alone butchers no less than 10,000 cows day by day, mentioned Emmanuel Jean, a U.S. Division of Agriculture meals security inspector. Statewide, beef is probably the most useful agricultural commodity, and meatpacking touches almost each nook of the town’s financial life.
In December 2006, throughout the George W. Bush administration, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided six meatpacking crops nationwide, arresting almost 1,300 undocumented staff from crops owned by Swift & Co again then. In Greeley, ICE detained 273 of its roughly 2,200 staff.
The raids despatched shockwaves via the group. Native leaders warned that eradicating a whole bunch of staff in a single day threatened not solely the plant’s operations, but additionally the broader financial system.
Certainly, the human toll was quick. Greater than 200 youngsters round Greeley had been left at colleges and day care facilities as a result of one or each dad and mom had been detained. Neighborhood teams, together with United Way, scrambled to rearrange youngster care.
The raids additionally decreased family revenue, native spending and belief in establishments as households struggled to cowl bond prices and sudden job losses, the Greeley Tribune reported. Worry lingered for years, discouraging undocumented residents from looking for providers or reporting crimes.
Economically, a Middle for Immigration Research report exhibits, the meatpacking crops operated at decreased capability for almost 5 months and Swift reported an $80 million loss within the weeks following the raids. To stabilize operations, Swift raised wages by about 8% to draw locals and provided $1,500 signing bonuses for jobs at its Greeley plant.
Dealing with collapse, Swift, then the nation’s third-largest beef and pork processor, turned to Brazil-based JBS S.A. The multinational firm acquired Swift in Might 2007 for about $1.5 billion.
JBS instantly stepped up Swift’s immigrant hiring to spice up manufacturing, which entailed recruiting Somali and Burmese refugees, to offset persistent shortages, in accordance with the report. Staff from Benin additionally arrived in recent times, adopted by the Haitians.
On the state stage, Colorado handed House Bill 24-1280 to create a $2.5 million immigrant integration program. The grant supported immigrants throughout their first yr within the U.S., together with in rural areas like Greeley. A number of Haitians instructed The Haitian Instances they obtained about $600 a month for six months whereas ready for work permits.
As soon as on the town, JBS welcomed its immigrant staff. The corporate additionally sponsored the burgeoning Haitian group’s soccer workforce, permitting its white brand to seem on the gamers’ uniforms.
‘Immigrants are my mates, neighbors and household’
Though its immigrant recruiting efforts helped preserve manufacturing, questions stay about situations on the plant — one cause so few U.S.-born residents take these jobs.
In recent times, JBS has confronted a number of lawsuits over employee safety, discrimination, price-fixing and environmental violations — together with a $5.5 million settlement in 2021 for discrimination towards Muslim staff. In December 2025, Haitian staff additionally filed a go well with alleging that JBS subjected them to discriminatory and unsafe working and residing situations after recruiting them underneath false guarantees. That case includes a Haitian native named Mackenson Remy, who allegedly lured Haitians to Greeley underneath false pretenses via social media.
Nonetheless, on the JBS plant in January, staff appeared untouched by the continued fits and ICE operations, at the same time as these in different states made headlines.
“We’re calm right here in Greeley, however we aren’t an exception,” mentioned the sociology teacher at Goals School. “Immigrants are my mates, neighbors and household.”
Sporting a button on his shirt marked “Justice for Alex Jeffrey Pretti” — the 37-year-old ICU registered nurse who was shot lifeless by an ICE agent in Minneapolis — the teacher defined that Greeley residents are very a lot conscious of what’s at stake.
“What’s taking place with ICE doesn’t simply have an effect on immigrants,” the teacher added. “In Greeley, everybody feels how shortly life might be upended when worry and uncertainty ripple via the entire group.”
‘Hunt for immigrants’ to come back work continuously
Native officers could also be watching the federal authorities’s heavy-handed techniques, however they haven’t mentioned something publicly about how — or if — they may alter their plans.
Months earlier than masked ICE brokers performed raids, Greeley’s leaders brazenly acknowledged that the town’s development relies on a steady workforce and tax base. Throughout his marketing campaign, Corridor championed the $1.1 billion West Greeley Development Project dubbed “Catalyst,” anticipated to generate about $44 million yearly via tourism and leisure.
“Strategic tasks assist develop our tax base and assist native companies,” Corridor mentioned throughout the marketing campaign. “That’s how we pay for development.”
Such plans — a lot of which depend on staff to construct, workers and maintain them — now face a wave of immigration govt orders from the Trump administration. His February 2025 Executive Order redefining who deserves to be thought of a refugee, for one, prompted the town supervisor to acknowledge the priority and uncertainty the order triggered. That yr, the administration additionally rescinded about $24 million in FEMA reimbursements for Denver’s migrant sheltering prices, prompting a lawsuit and inflicting the bigger metropolis to slash migrant service funding from about $90 million in 2024 to $12.5 million in 2025.
New federal directives additionally paused asylum selections and a few parole applications, such because the Biden-era humanitarian parole course of for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans. The administration additionally moved to finish TPS, which any Haitian might apply for no matter how they arrived within the U.S.
For Pierre, a TPS holder with a pending asylum software, the contradiction between federal coverage and day by day realities feels private.
Pierre mentioned as February arrived, JBS warned many Haitian staff they could possibly be terminated in the event that they failed to offer up to date work authorization by Feb. 5. Days later, U.S. District Choose Ana C. Reyes blocked the administration’s try to finish TPS for Haitians.
“The choose’s order helped the group breathe a bit,” Pierre mentioned. “However the uncertainty doesn’t go away.”
Till a closing choice comes down, those that can are persevering with to work as a lot as attainable to avoid wasting. The work is fast-paced, bodily taxing and sometimes harmful — fueling fixed turnover. However with hourly wages at meatpacking crops starting from about $24 to $34, properly above Colorado’s minimum wage of $15.16 per hour, those that can face up to it accomplish that.
That churn retains firms perpetually recruiting.
Emmanuel Charles, a former JBS worker now supervising at Walmart, mentioned the cycle is predictable.
“They pay comparatively properly,” Charles explains. “However after a yr or two, many depart. Then dozens of jobs open directly — and the hunt for immigrant staff begins once more.”