How Immigration Enforcement Could Affect Child Labor Laws

Child labor may evoke Dickensian images of young children in dirty, oversized clothes laboring in dusty, dangerous workshops.

But this year legislators in Florida considered a bill (SB 918) that would have eliminated certain employment restrictions on 16-and 17-year-olds and allowed minors as young as 14 to work overnight shifts.

Rep. Jay Collins (R), the measure’s sponsor, dismissed criticism that it would lead to the exploitation of children.

“Ultimately, we’re not talking about ‘The Jungle’ by Upton Sinclair. We’re talking about them working at Publix, at Piggly Wiggly or jobs within the industry,” he said at a committee meeting. “This is a parental rights thing. Parents know their kids best.”

Supporters of the bill were also candid about the fact that it was aimed in part at filling jobs vacated by undocumented immigrants, who made up 7.5% of the state’s total labor force as of 2022, with many of them employed in the state’s agriculture, construction and service sectors.

“Why do we say we need to import foreigners, even import them illegally, when you know, teenagers used to work at these resorts, college students should be able to do this stuff,” Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said at a panel discussion with President Trump’s border czar Tom Homan.

While SB 918 was ultimately shelved, Elias Kahn, senior product manager for labor and employment, tax, federal government and employee benefits and executive compensation for Practical Guidance at LexisNexis®, said several states have relaxed their child labor laws recently. Arkansas, Iowa, New Hampshire and New Jersey did so in 2023, and Alabama, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Utah and West Virginia did so last year. [See Child Labor State Law Survey for a detailed summary of state child labor laws, Child Labor Restrictions under the FLSA for an analysis of federal child labor laws, and Child Labor Laws – Compliance Best Practices for guidance on complying with these laws.]

While much of the attention in Los Angeles and elsewhere has been on the effect the Trump administration’s immigration policies are having on undocumented individuals, Kahn said the administration’s tough stance could also have an impact on labor laws throughout the country, particularly those affecting children.

“There are still a lot of proponents of relaxing child labor laws,” he said, despite the Florida bill’s mid-June demise.

Kahn pointed to the Florida legislators’ and governor’s frankness about that proposal as a clear sign of the urgency some feel on the issue. In state houses across the country, legislators sometimes hide or disguise their motivations for supporting bills. But not in the case of the Florida proposal. Kahn explained that concerns over workforce shortages due to deportations of immigrants were front and center in the debate over whether to relax restrictions on child labor to help replace these workers.

Numerous States Addressing Employment of Minors

At least 19 states have introduced bills dealing with the employment of minors this year, according to the LexisNexis® State Net® legislative tracking system. Six of those states have enacted such measures.

Several Industries Could Feel Impact of Crackdown

Kahn said the focus on child labor is a microcosm of a growing concern across the country about how heavy immigration enforcement could affect the country’s pool of available workers in an array of settings and industries.

In May, Practical Guidance addressed labor shortages in the construction industry, finding that President Trump’s policies are playing a role.

“(A)ny laws that concern employment and/or immigration will have a major impact on construction work,” wrote Brenda Radmacher, Sean Piers, Sydney Jenkins and Leon Rodriguez of the law firm Seyfarth Shaw. “President Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign exerted substantial focus on strict immigration policies, grounded in the idea that immigrants are to blame for the rising cost of housing and other social ills. While economic data and independent research suggest the correlation between immigrants and these negative phenomena may be limited, the Trump Administration has not shied away from enforcing that ideology in political and legal action.”

They conclude: “The considerable increase in immigration enforcement, as well as initiatives to terminate the availability of certain categories of immigration relief that have allowed hundreds of thousands of workers to legally enter the U.S., promise to decrease workforce availability for the construction industry.”

Kahn said President Trump’s immigration policies could also have downstream impacts on other workforces, especially in agriculture, hotels and restaurants.

“Undocumented workers work in a variety of industries,” he said. “You need labor to do these essential jobs, whether it be construction, hospitality, restaurants, agriculture, janitorial services. The list goes on and on. You need people to do these jobs.”

“If they’re all of the sudden taken out,” he said, “it will be difficult to replace them.”

Relaxing Standards Could Become Trend

Worries about the country’s available workforce come against the backdrop of a low unemployment rate across the country, standing at 4.2 percent in May.

With the pool of workers already low, at least on paper, Kahn said some business leaders, particularly in the hotel, restaurant and farming industries, are actively lobbying the Trump administration to cease or lower the number of deportations of immigrants who work in these industries.

The president, however, seems intent on overseeing the largest mass deportation in U.S. history.

If that turns out to be the case, despite industries’ urging to the contrary, Kahn said some businesses might respond by raising wages or investing more in workforce recruitment to attract more employees.

“Businesses are going to have to react and get their necessary labor however they can,” he said.

“But they’re also likely to turn to their state legislators for help,” he said, adding that he wouldn’t be at all surprised if proposals to relax child labor laws to help counteract workforce shortages become a policy trend.

In particular, he speculated that Florida might revisit the idea in another form, or other states, especially Republican-controlled ones, could latch onto it. Kahn said Ohio is currently considering a proposal (SB 50) to loosen restrictions on the hours minors can work, and he expects more states to follow suit in 2025.

—By SNCJ Correspondent BRIAN JOSEPH

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