By ALEJANDRO FIGUEROA/Oregon Public Broadcasting
The Oregon Farm Bureau says its members are raising concerns about targeted immigration enforcements in agricultural communities after U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement officials were sighted in Yamhill County.
Federal immigration officials arrested a Newberg vineyard management business owner and one of his employees on Thursday. Now the farm bureau, which is Oregon’s largest agriculture group, is working to connect farmworkers and farmers to legal resources.
“Labor is always a concern for farmers because unlike other industries, it requires a labor force that is willing to work,” said Austin McClister, a spokesperson for the farm bureau. “And most domestic workers don’t apply for jobs. And if we don’t have workers, we don’t get people fed.”
There are no clear numbers, but in Oregon, as much as one-third of agricultural workers are in the U.S. without legal status.
Agricultural communities across the country are reckoning with increased targeted immigration enforcement actions, and the Trump administration has sent mixed signals over whether the agriculture industry is immune to Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids.
Last week, President Donald Trump ordered a pause on workplace raids in the farming and hospitality industries. Then the administration quickly reversed course.
The Oregon Farm Bureau is in a tight spot. Many of its members are politically conservative and may support President Donald Trump, but they also may rely on immigrant farmworkers.
While the farm bureau does not have a political position on what it wants the federal administration to do, McClister said one thing is clear: The industry needs workers to stay in business.
In Yamhill County and other agricultural communities across Oregon, the arrest of Moises Sotelo Casas last week has heightened concerns about that labor crisis.
ICE officers arrested Sotelo Casas while he was on his way to work last Thursday. Sotelo Casas is the owner of a vineyard management business and a well-known figure in Newberg and within the local vineyard industry.
He was initially held at the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma, Washington, although an ICE detainee locator database indicates he was recently moved to Arizona.
His supporters in Newberg have said Sotelo Casas is a respected figure in the wine industry and in his community. He’s a father of three, a grandfather and is closely involved at his local church. As of Wednesday, a GoFundMe campaign for Sotelo Casas had raised over $100,000 to cover legal fees and other expenses for his family.
An ICE spokesperson told OPB that Sotelo Casas was arrested as part of routine federal law enforcement activity.
“Sotelo first entered the United States illegally in 2006, was arrested by U.S. Border Patrol that resulted in an expedited removal to Mexico,” the spokesperson wrote in an email statement. “Sotelo has a criminal conviction for DUI in Newberg, OR and he will remain in custody pending removal.”
A search for Sotelo Casas’ criminal records only yields minor traffic violations, just two speeding tickets, no driving under the influence of intoxicants charges. OPB also checked with the Yamhill County District Attorney’s office and the Newberg Municipal Court, but neither could find records of a DUII charge for Sotelo Casas. The ICE spokesperson told OPB the charge was from 1997.
Newberg’s court only retains court records for DUII charges for 10 years. It would not have records of charges or convictions from the 1990s. ICE did not respond to a request for proof of any charges filed against Sotelo Casas and did not share any other information with OPB.
In a press release, the Oregon Farm Bureau pledged that it would work with farmers and workers to connect them with legal resources.
“We want to make sure that our farmers and farm workers both have the appropriate resources in uncertain times like this,” McClister said. “They’re both the invisible hands that get food out of the fields and out of farms and on the grocery shelves.”
- This story originally appeared June 18, 2025 on Oregon Public Broadcasting.
