DoomsdaysCW<p>When The U.S. Government Tried To Replace <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Migrant" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Migrant</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Farmworkers" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Farmworkers</span></a> With <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/HighSchoolers" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>HighSchoolers</span></a></p><p>August 23, 201810:41 AM ET<br>By Gustavo Arellano</p><p>Excerpt: "He remembers the first day vividly. Work started before dawn, the better to avoid the unforgiving desert sun to come. 'The wind is in your hair, and you don't think it's bad,' Carter says. 'Then you go out in the field, and the first ray of sun comes over the horizon. The first ray. Everyone looked at each other, and said, 'What did we do?' The thermometer went up like in a Bugs Bunny cartoon. By 9 a.m., it was 110 degrees.'</p><p>"Garden gloves that the farmers gave the students to help them harvest lasted only four hours, because the cantaloupe's fine hairs made grabbing them feel like 'picking up sandpaper.' They got paid minimum wage — $1.40 an hour back then — plus 5 cents for every crate filled with about 30 to 36 fruits. Breakfast was 'out of the Navy,' Carter says — beans and eggs and bologna sandwiches that literally toasted in the heat, even in the shade.</p><p>"The University High crew worked six days a week, with Sundays off, and they were not allowed to return home during their stint. The farmers sheltered them in 'any kind of defunct housing,' according to Carter — old Army barracks, rooms made from discarded wood, and even buildings used to intern Japanese-Americans during World War II.</p><p>"Problems arose immediately for the <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ATEAM" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>ATEAM</span></a> nationwide. In California's <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/SalinasValley" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>SalinasValley</span></a>, 200 teenagers from <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/NewMexico" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>NewMexico</span></a>, <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Kansas" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Kansas</span></a> and <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Wyoming" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Wyoming</span></a> quit after just two weeks on the job. 'We worked three days and all of us are broke,' the Associated Press quoted one teen as saying. Students elsewhere staged strikes. At the end, the A-TEAM was considered a giant failure and was never tried again." [Until today, apparently...]</p><p><a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/07/31/634442195/when-the-u-s-government-tried-to-replace-migrant-farmworkers-with-high-schoolers" rel="nofollow noopener" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://www.</span><span class="ellipsis">npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/</span><span class="invisible">07/31/634442195/when-the-u-s-government-tried-to-replace-migrant-farmworkers-with-high-schoolers</span></a></p><p><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/immigrants" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>immigrants</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ImmigrantsFeedUs" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>ImmigrantsFeedUs</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Farmworkers" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Farmworkers</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ResistICE" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>ResistICE</span></a><br><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Authoritarianism" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Authoritarianism</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ImmigrationCrackdown" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>ImmigrationCrackdown</span></a><br><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ICERaids" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>ICERaids</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/HungerGames" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>HungerGames</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/EatTheRich" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>EatTheRich</span></a><br><a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/ThisIsFascism" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>ThisIsFascism</span></a> <a href="https://kolektiva.social/tags/Project2025" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Project2025</span></a></p>