From the desert to the Strip: How the election’s fight over immigration may upend Nevada’s economy

By WILL WEISSERT Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — In the remote Nevada desert, the Baker Ranch couldn’t survive without immigrant guest workers who come every year from Mexico.

About 300 miles to the south In Las Vegas — increasingly a vacation playground for Americans from all political and socioeconomic backgrounds — immigrants are just as vital, keeping the 24-hour economy humming all day, every day.

Immigration has become a source of fear and frustration for voters in this presidential election — with possible outcomes that could take the United States down two dramatically different paths. But immigrants who have been in the country for decades say a nuanced issue has been drowned out by seemingly simpler solutions championed by both parties.

Nowhere are the complicated economic and social realities behind the searing-hot political divide on immigration more clear than in Nevada, a toss-up state that could decide an increasingly close election.

Here are highlights from the AP’s report:

How immigration has shaped the presidential race

The influx of illegal border crossings long strained city and state resources even in Democratic strongholds across the country, even as encounters between immigrants and law enforcement officials have declined sharply in recent months. And yet, immigration has fueled job growth in ways that strengthen the economy and improve the federal government’s fiscal health.

Former President Donald Trump is championing hardline proposals that would force mass deportations, while Vice President Kamala Harris is calling for pathways to citizenship for millions of people in the country illegally. But Harris is also calling for increased funding for border security enforcement and strengthening existing Biden administration actions that tightened rules for immigrants to seek asylum in the U.S. when they arrive at the southern border.

“I think that our focus is completely directed into the border and not toward the people who are already here and have been here for many, many years,” said Erika Marquez, immigrant justice organizer for the advocacy group Make the Road Nevada.

Bipartisan support for guest workers — to a point

Both parties have called for expanding guest worker programs in agriculture.

The Trump administration deemed guest farmworkers essential during the coronavirus pandemic, and the program’s participation rose while he was in office. But he also proposed a rule freezing farmworkers’ salaries for two years, loosening requirements for worker housing and restricting the transportation costs they could be reimbursed for.

The Biden administration wiped out those rules. Since then, more than 310,000 H-2A visas were issued in fiscal year 2023, compared to around 213,000 in fiscal year 2020, the last full one under Trump. But the Biden White House also imposed a series of new rules meant to better protect workers that have occasionally frustrated business owners like the Bakers.

“It is a hot potato and each side’s lobbing one at the other. And, in all honesty, both are to blame,” Janille Baker, who runs the ranch’s financial books, said of immigration. “There is going to come a point where it has to get taken care of. You can’t just keep using fearmongering and scaring people, and then being critical of the people who do or don’t want to do whatever jobs.”

Erika Marquez, left, embraces Leticia Pinedo after a meeting at the nonprofit Make the Road Nevada, Thursday, Sept. 12, 2024, in Las Vegas. Marquez is a recipient of an Obama administration amnesty for immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children. (AP Photo/John Locher)

A state economy powered by immigrants

In Nevada, nearly 19% of residents are foreign-born and 9% of the total workforce does not have U.S. legal status. If the state lost all of its workers in the country illegally, Labor Department figures suggest the direct job losses would be roughly as large as those from the 2008 financial crisis, which stalled tourism, triggered a wave of housing market foreclosures and cost the state about 9.3% of its jobs during the subsequent Great Recession.

“In our wonderful, 24-hour economy, we know that these hotels and casinos could not, should not, would not be able to open every day without immigrants,” said Peter Guzman, president and CEO of the Latin Chamber of Commerce in Nevada.

And even rounding up people in the country illegally might not count those with temporary protected status, or the guest workers on Baker ranch, all of whom are authorized to be in the U.S.

Haydee Zetino, who scrubs lavish hotel suites at Harrah’s Casino on the famed Las Vegas strip, is an immigrant from El Salvador with only temporary protected status in the U.S. The 62-year-old saw Trump try to strip away many such protections during his first term and worries it could happen again if he wins — even as she can’t vote herself as a non-citizen.

“These people don’t have any conscience,” she said of mass deportation supporters. “They believe they can lift up the country, move the economy forward, but they don’t think of those at the bottom.”

Tom Baker, co-owns the Baker ranch with his two brothers, looks at bales on the Baker Ranch Monday, Sept. 9, 2024, in Baker, Nevada. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

A small state that could be a big factor on Election Day

The Pew Research Center estimates that 11 million people in the country illegally live in the U.S. Big states like California, Texas and Florida have larger numbers who potentially could have even more influence on workforces and communities. But all of those states are all solidly red or blue in presidential races — and aren’t likely to sway the election as toss-up Nevada might.

Despite having just six electoral votes, Nevada could go for either Trump or Harris. Clark County, encompassing Las Vegas, is about 75% of the state’s population and includes a sizeable number of hospitality industry workers represented by Nevada’s powerful Culinary Union, which has endorsed Harris.

But Trump was able to turn out infrequent voters there in 2020, and did well in much of the rest of the state, which is rural and more conservative. Washoe County, home to Reno, is a perennial toss-up. Voters can also choose “None” of the presidential candidates, adding to the Nevada electorate’s famously fickle nature.

It’s all left some voters afraid of what the outcome might be.

“There’s a lot of fear,” said Nancy Valenzuela, a 48-year-old maid who works at the Strat casino. “There are people who don’t have papers. They’re like, ‘They want to throw us all out.'”

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