By Stacy M. Brown, Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent
A top Trump administration official is proposing what critics call a thinly veiled form of forced labor, suggesting that millions of low-income Americans on Medicaid should be used to replace undocumented immigrants the government is deporting en masse from U.S. farms. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins laid out the administration’s vision in blunt terms on Tuesday. “There will be no amnesty. The mass deportations continue, but in a strategic way,” Rollins told reporters after meeting with Republican governors. “We move the workforce towards automation and 100% American participation, which, again, with 34 million people—able-bodied adults on Medicaid—we should be able to do that fairly quickly.”
She added, “Ultimately, the answer on this is automation, also some reform within the current governing structure. And then also, when you think about it, there are 34 million able-bodied adults in our Medicaid program. There are plenty of workers in America.” The remarks echo proposals President Donald Trump himself has floated in recent months, including a plan to compel farmers to house and supervise migrant laborers to avoid ICE raids directly—an arrangement many civil rights experts have warned resembles indentured servitude. Rollins’ suggestion goes further, signaling the administration wants to turn Medicaid enrollment—a health insurance lifeline—into a de facto roster of people to be mobilized for field work.
Health policy experts say this is not only an assault on the safety net but an attack on basic civil rights. Medicaid exists to provide healthcare for people living in poverty, not to support an unpaid or underpaid agricultural workforce. Data show that the policy would hit Black Americans especially hard. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, Black individuals make up nearly 19% of Medicaid enrollees under 65, despite being about 13% of the total U.S. population. In many states, including Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi, the share is far higher. Medicaid finances nearly 41% of all births nationwide and covers over 30% of Black Americans overall.
Critics also point out that the policy would primarily target women and children: nearly half of Medicaid enrollees are under 19 years old, and many adults in the program are mothers or caregivers. In 2023, about 47.6% of Medicaid enrollees were adults between 19 and 64, including millions of people with disabilities and chronic illnesses. “This is state-sanctioned exploitation,” said a policy researcher who reviewed Rollins’ comments. “They are literally talking about rounding up the poorest Americans—disproportionately Black and brown—and telling them to replace deported immigrants in the fields. That’s not a jobs program. That’s forced labor.”
Even among the working-age adults enrolled in Medicaid, many are already employed in low-wage jobs that do not offer insurance. Others are caretakers or people with severe health conditions. Federal law does not require Medicaid recipients to accept any form of employment as a condition of coverage. Farmers themselves have warned that the administration’s deportation and labor policies will trigger food shortages and economic chaos. Growers across the country rely on immigrant workers to harvest crops—labor that is already among the most dangerous and poorly paid in the U.S. Some of Trump’s allies have promoted proposals to require farms to lodge and monitor their remaining migrant workforce, raising alarms about “company town” conditions that legal experts say blur the line between employment and captivity.
Rollins, however, was adamant. “This is the direction,” she said. “There are plenty of workers in America.” The White House did not respond to questions about how forcing Medicaid recipients into agricultural work would comply with labor laws, disability rights statutes, or the constitutional ban on involuntary servitude. A civil rights advocate put it more bluntly: “This is not immigration policy. This is an attempt to resurrect slavery in America under a different name.”
