U.S. President Donald Trump speaks with the media after his return from Pennsylvania, at Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, U.S., May 30, 2025. REUTERS/Leah Millis REFILE - CORRECTING LOCATION FROM "WASHINGTON, D.C." TO "JOINT BASE ANDREWS, MARYLAND".
President Donald Trump's social media post "backfired" when he vowed "changes are coming" to protect farmers and hospitality workers from his mass deportation plans, a Republican lobbyist warned Friday.
Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform that his mass crackdown on illegal immigration led to significant labor shortages for farmers and the hospitality industry, sectors heavily reliant on migrant workers.
"Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace. In many cases the Criminals allowed into our Country by the VERY Stupid Biden Open Borders Policy are applying for those jobs. This is not good. We must protect our Farmers, but get the CRIMINALS OUT OF THE USA. Changes are coming!" he wrote.
Trump also said people who have worked on a farm for "20, 25 years" shouldn't be forced to leave the country.
As of Friday, there have been no policy changes or exemptions enacted for farm workers. A White House official told The Washington Post that Trump "sought to soothe industry leaders" in those fields, but that there were "no plans" to alter their crackdown plans.
Tom Homan, President Trump's chief of immigration enforcement, has said there are no plans to change current immigration policies to exempt farm, hotel, or other leisure workers.
A Republican lobbyist told Notus on Friday the post was ill-advised. If it was intended to smooth over any anxieties, they said, it "backfired."
"We still have a worker shortage. How are you going to solve that? And I don't know if that tweet made people feel like they were going to solve it anytime sooner," the lobbyist added.