Idaho dairy workers spark GOP split over deportations

Idaho Republicans – In deep-red Idaho, survey results show many Republicans backing a legal pathway for long-term dairy workers and warning that stronger ICE presence could harm the state’s farm economy—even as federal immigration enforcement escalates under the Trump administrat

For years, Idaho politics has been treated as a reliable mirror of national Republican messaging. But on farms where milk and labor are inseparable, the numbers don’t line up cleanly with the crackdown rhetoric coming from Washington.

This isn’t just an academic disagreement. It is showing up as fear on job sites. and it is surfacing in a statewide survey that finds broad support for legal working status for certain immigrant workers—along with a majority of Idahoans saying greater ICE presence would hurt the state’s agricultural economy.

Under the second Trump administration, the United States has seen mass deportations and a sharp escalation in immigration enforcement. The Department of Homeland Security says the crackdown pushed nearly 3 million people out of the country in Trump’s first year back in office. For the first time since the 1960s, the number of immigrants living in the U.S. is declining, and because most farmworkers are foreign born, those losses are beginning to strain American farms.

The fallout reaches beyond federal policy language. The Center for Migration Studies reports that 86% of farmworkers in the U.S. are foreign born, and 45% are undocumented. In 2025, the Trump administration suggested it would not target farms. Even so, farmworkers across the country are scared to go to work.

Between March and July 2025. the agricultural workforce declined by 7%. with farms reporting labor shortages in states that voted for Trump—such as Pennsylvania—and in states that didn’t—such as California. Immigration crackdowns are also raising alarms tied to food security. as communities confront the practical reality that crops don’t wait for policy.

Idaho’s stakes are unusually direct. Agriculture is not a side industry in the Gem State; it is a major economic engine. accounting for 20% of Idaho’s annual GDP. according to the Idaho State Department of Agriculture. Dairy is a centerpiece, with Idaho ranked as the fourth-largest milk producer in the U.S. by the Idaho Dairymen’s Association. And 90% of Idaho dairy workers are foreign born.

Idaho is also a deeply red state by political measures that national strategists often use as shortcuts. About 60% of voters are registered Republicans, and 67% voted for Trump in 2024. That made it a particularly sharp test of whether intensifying immigration enforcement and heated national rhetoric match what people who depend on immigrant labor actually believe.

The 11th annual Idaho Public Policy Survey polled 1,000 adults in the fall of 2025. The survey asked about a pathway to legal working status for long-term residents without a criminal record—specifically. dairy workers and their families who have lived in Idaho more than 10 years. The results showed broad support: 85% of respondents were in favor of such a pathway. including 56% who were strongly supportive and 29% who were somewhat. Just 9% opposed.

The survey expected immigration positions to track neatly with party lines. They didn’t. Support cut across party identities: 79% of Republicans, 88% of independents, and 95% of Democrats were in favor.

That same local lens shaped how respondents viewed enforcement itself. Participants were asked whether increased presence from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, would help or harm Idaho’s agricultural economy. More than half—53%—said it would harm the economy. Nineteen percent said it would help, 18% said there would be no impact, and 10% were unsure.

Even within the state’s conservative electorate, the view was fractured. Residents of agriculture-dependent regions were more likely to say ICE presence would hurt the economy. Republicans were more likely than others to say ICE presence would help. but even there the margin was narrow and the skepticism was real: only 35% of Republicans responded that it would help. compared with 11% of independents and less than 3% of Democrats.

The survey’s central tension is hard to miss. Federal enforcement has intensified at the same time that communities reliant on foreign-born labor are feeling the consequences—first as anxiety and staffing shortfalls. and then as a shift in what voters say they want for the people already embedded in local rural economies. In agriculture-dependent Idaho. many residents say they recognize the role immigrants play in sustaining local rural economies. and research suggests that recognition can shift attitudes about immigration. potentially increasing support for more inclusive policies.

The lesson from Idaho’s data is that public opinion there is more nuanced than a simple right-left divide suggests. The findings. the survey researchers say. are likely to hold in other places similarly dependent on agriculture. from Wisconsin to Delaware. where farmers have been speaking up about reliance on immigrant labor.

For now, the country’s immigration debate is still largely scripted as a partisan contest. But in Idaho. where dairy workers have lived in the state for more than 10 years and farms are reporting shortages. the political script is colliding with daily reality: people can support enforcement in one breath and worry about its local costs in the next.

Idaho farmworkers immigration enforcement ICE deportations dairy workers Trump administration Department of Homeland Security public opinion survey