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Nobody in Wilder, Idaho expected this. The tiny farming town of 1,725 people—where nine out of ten voters backed Donald Trump in 2024—is now scrambling to figure out what comes next after federal immigration agents swept through in mid-October and arrested more than 100 Hispanic workers at a local horse racetrack. So far, 75 people have been deported, and the farms that keep this place running are facing a labour shortage with no easy fix in sight.

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[-] homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 146 points 2 weeks ago

John Carter runs a security company that worked at the racetrack, and he's a Trump supporter himself. But what he saw that day shook him up. He watched agents point automatic rifles at people and set off flash-bang grenades while arresting Ivan Tellez, who allegedly operated the track.

It wasn't just Immigration and Customs Enforcement, either. Multiple agencies turned up—federal, state, local. The sheriff came through on horseback. A black military helicopter circled overhead. Adults, including parents holding toddlers, and plenty of teenagers got their hands zip-tied. Everyone at the track was rounded up and herded to one end.

Carter's own 14-year-old daughter was there. She got zip-tied, too. He saw officers pointing guns at teenagers. The whole thing felt less like a law enforcement operation and more like a military raid.

Well, sounds like they had the day they voted for.

[-] prole 20 points 2 weeks ago

I would bet my next paycheck that he's still a Trump supporter.

[-] apftwb@lemmy.world 15 points 2 weeks ago

"look, there's a lot I disagree with the president on, including pointing a gun at my daughter. But I'm really... But I really like what he's doing with immigration."

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 10 points 2 weeks ago

Can we call them nazis yet, or is that still an "exaggeration"?

[-] ArmchairAce1944@lemmy.ca 53 points 2 weeks ago

He is going to cause a famine, isnt he?

[-] Canconda@lemmy.ca 10 points 2 weeks ago

No that's climate change and hyper integrated global food supply chains you're thinking of.

[-] FireRetardant@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago

He'd still happily take credit for it

[-] RamenJunkie@midwest.social 5 points 2 weeks ago

I mean, theybare pushing Coal again and shitting all over Wind and Solar.

So....

[-] Canconda@lemmy.ca 4 points 2 weeks ago

Fully agree!

But IMO regardless there is going to be major global food supply chain interruptions, as industries that take years to decades to mature disappear faster than they can be re-established.

In my region we have had entire fruit crops destroyed by cold snaps following an unseasonably warm winter. Meaning there was multiple year gaps in output from an entire region.

[-] lobut@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 weeks ago

Not for leopards apparently though.

[-] grue@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

In some other country, maybe (assuming the USAID cuts haven't done it already). Even poor people in the US are rich enough to outbid people in the developing world on food imports, if it were truly necessary, so if we did fuck up our own harvest enough to cause a real shortage we'd just buy somebody else's.

[-] ArmchairAce1944@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 weeks ago

so he's going to cause famines in OTHER countries then? That isn't much better. Just like this destruction of USAID (as you mentioned) had already killed hundreds of thousands of people.

[-] kent_eh@lemmy.ca 49 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Nobody in Wilder, Idaho expected this.

Yet most of them voted for exactly this to happen (to someone else...)

[-] yesterday@lemmy.ca 50 points 2 weeks ago

'We rely on Hispanic labour,' he told The New York Times this past Sunday. 'Nobody thought something like this could happen here.' Wilder felt far enough off the beaten path that residents assumed the aggressive immigration crackdowns they'd been hearing about were a big-city problem.

They actually said it. Incredible.

[-] CileTheSane@lemmy.ca 16 points 2 weeks ago

The only moral immigrant worker is my immigrant worker.

[-] kent_eh@lemmy.ca 9 points 2 weeks ago

You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land—the common clay of the new West. You know... morons.

[-] Washedupcynic@lemmy.ca 35 points 2 weeks ago

Dear Wilder, Idaho, welcome to the find out phase that follows fucking around. Enjoy getting what you voted for. I hope your whole town goes fucking bankrupt.

[-] thesohoriots@lemmy.world 35 points 2 weeks ago

They finally got their own private Idaho.

[-] RestrictedAccount@lemmy.world 4 points 2 weeks ago
[-] Afaithfulnihilist@lemmy.dbzer0.com 32 points 2 weeks ago

This is the first step, the next one is buying those farms when the farmers default and then the final step is rich people gobbling up all of this property to turn it into factory farmland.

During the transition we're going to see Americans starve. Some of us will die but that is a sacrifice they are willing to make for more profits.

[-] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 7 points 2 weeks ago

They also plan on renting those people back to the farms.

[-] BeardededSquidward 5 points 2 weeks ago

Nah, we won't starve, they'll just start a new brand of food called soylent green.

[-] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 30 points 2 weeks ago

I hope every Latino immigrant leaves or refuses to work the fields in these Republican towns, so they can figure out what their votes and immigration policy stances mean.

[-] Soleos@lemmy.world 5 points 2 weeks ago

Most immigrants were there in the first place because they have people to feed. What do you suppose they should do as an alternative after they refuse to work in those fields?

[-] howrar@lemmy.ca 6 points 2 weeks ago

Whatever the alternative, it's better than dying in a prison cell.

[-] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 weeks ago

If staying on a farm, something like a field in Vermont or in the PNW Cascades area. If something like construction, it's in demand all over the place.

[-] WoodScientist@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

Work in another area that's had many immigrants deported, but in an area and industry that doesn't fellate Republicans.

[-] Ragallos@lemmy.dbzer0.com 24 points 2 weeks ago

Having grown up in Idaho, not too far from Wilder. All I gotta say is, fuck em. Stupid bootlickers only "didn't know to expect this" because they're fucking stupid. Glad I can continue to hate Idaho forever. Disgusting place.

[-] Manifish_Destiny@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago

Land is pretty though. Big shame about the people.

[-] Ragallos@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 weeks ago

Agreed, especially central Idaho. Thos mountains hold some magnificent unblemished (as far as I remember) nature. But the people.....

[-] CileTheSane@lemmy.ca 23 points 2 weeks ago

Thing Conservatives were warned was going to happen, happens. Conservatives shocked: "who could have seen this coming?"

[-] douz0a0bouz@midwest.social 13 points 2 weeks ago

They might not have actually seen it coming. I grew up in a place like that and the echo chambers are real and debilitating. There is a reason most rural areas only have fox as their news broadcaster. Information deprivation and misinformation has been the plan for decades.

[-] CileTheSane@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 weeks ago

"Nobody could have seen this coming" said about an event that everyone else saw coming still doesn't make me very sympathetic.

[-] wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 17 points 2 weeks ago

Oh no, white people will have to harvest their own potatoes!

Well, they can't sell them anyway cause the processing facilities are having labor shortages too. Wonder why...

[-] KingGordon@lemmy.world 16 points 2 weeks ago

You can tell it’s fascism by the way the fascists fascist!

[-] Daedskin@lemmy.zip 15 points 2 weeks ago

As someone who used to live out in the farmland past Wilder — having to drive through Wilder to get to Boise — basically all the farm workers you see are Hispanic. Wilder itself is this tiny town surrounded by farmland. It boggles my mind that people presented with those facts day-in and day-out never put two and two together that removing or scaring away the demographic that makes up all your workers means your town becomes worthless.

[-] WoodScientist@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago

Conservatism is built in reality denial and magical thinking. That's literally the entire foundation of it. Anything that isn't politically correct to the current party narrative is immediately dismissed or denied. The modern Republican party is a Maoist cult of personality.

[-] electric_nan@lemmy.ml 14 points 2 weeks ago

Forgot to pay the protection fee.

[-] BigMacHole@sopuli.xyz 13 points 2 weeks ago

Thanks OBAMA!

-This Town ~~Probably!~~

[-] MehBlah@lemmy.world 11 points 2 weeks ago

It doesn't matter. They will vote red next time.

[-] whotookkarl@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Nobody in Wilder, Idaho expected this.

Underfunded, understaffed, undermined US public education

[-] The_Almighty_Walrus@lemmy.world 4 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

"I never thought the leopards would eat MY face!" Says woman who voted for the leopards eating faces party

[-] Darkness343@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago

Weren't those idiot rednecks supposed to breed like rabbits and have their kids tend to the fields?

Where did we go wrong?

this post was submitted on 09 Feb 2026
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LeopardsAteMyFace

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'I never thought leopards would eat MY face,' sobs woman who voted for the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party.

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