Business owners on Martha’s Vineyard have spent years begging for more mass immigration to the United States in the hopes of filling summer jobs with foreign workers.
When 50 illegal aliens were flown onto the elite coastal island, home to the nation’s wealthiest and most well-connected, officials declared a “humanitarian crisis” and Gov. Charlie Baker (R) swiftly deported the new arrivals to a military base on Cape Cod.
The reaction to just 0.001 percent of the nation’s border crisis arriving on the doorsteps of Martha’s Vineyard residents comes after business owners spent years pleading with the federal government to import more foreign workers so they could fill jobs.
“At some point in time, they have to move from here to somewhere else. We don’t have the services to take care of 50 immigrants,” an official said when the illegal aliens arrived. “We certainly don’t have housing. We’re in a housing crisis as we are on this island, so we can’t house everyone here that lives here and works here. We don’t have housing for 50 more people.”
In September 2018, a Martha’s Vineyard business owner complained to the New York Times that he lost out on Jamaican workers and had to scrub toilets himself:
This summer, he has found himself on his hands and knees scrubbing toilets and tubs at Edgartown Commons, a hotel he manages on Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts. Five Jamaican workers who had long worked at the property failed to get H2-B seasonal-work visas.
“I’m 65 years old, but you got to do what you got to do,” he said. “We did hire contract workers, but it’s never going to be as good as people with years of experience.”
