Despite what they said, they didn’t just target undocumented immigrants.
June 9, 1954: INS Commissioner General Joseph Swing announced the start of Operation Wetback, a mass deportation campaign across the American Southwest.
During World War II, the United States faced severe agricultural labor shortages, compounded by the removal and incarceration of more than 120,000 Japanese Americans, many of whom worked in agriculture.
To address the problem, the United States and Mexico negotiated a temporary worker agreement that eventually became the Bracero Program under Public Law 78. The arrangement was intended to provide Mexican workers with legal employment while guaranteeing wages, transportation, housing, and other protections.
Not everyone followed the rules. Mexico eventually excluded Texas from the program because of widespread reports of discrimination, contract violations, and mistreatment of workers. Yet many agricultural interests continued to rely on Mexican labor, often hiring undocumented workers while ignoring labor protections required by law. The result was a system that depended on Mexican workers while offering many of them little protection.
Courtesy of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration
Before World War II, Florin was known as the “Strawberry Capital of the World,” thanks in large part to Japanese American farming ingenuity and productivity.
Photo by Dorothea Lange
The first Bracero workers arrive in Sacramento in 1942. The Bracero Program would bring millions of Mexican workers to the United States during and after WWII.
Photo by Dorothea Lange
Prospective Bracero workers complete processing and contract paperwork. Millions of Mexican laborers entered the U.S. through the Bracero Program between 1942 and 1964.
Courtesy of Oregon State University
Mexican agricultural workers harvest flax in Oregon, c1946. Across the American West, farms increasingly depended on Mexican labor during and after World War II.
Courtesy of the Mexican American Affairs Committ
By the early 1950s, hundreds of thousands of Mexicans were crossing the border each year, legally and illegally, to meet the labor demands of the American economy.
Photo by Harry Pennington
Mexican migrants detained by the Texas Border Patrol near the border, June 1948. By the late 1940s, unauthorized immigration were becoming a growing political issue.
The Immigration Explosion
World War II and the postwar economic boom increased demand for inexpensive agricultural labor.
Migration from Mexico surged.
By the early 1950s, an estimated one million Mexican migrants were entering the United States annually, both legally and illegally. Between 1944 and 1954, the number of undocumented crossings increased dramatically. By 1954, more than one million workers were believed to have entered the country without authorization.
Southwestern agriculture depended heavily on their labor.
At the same time, politicians, labor organizations, and immigration officials increasingly portrayed the situation as a national crisis.
An “Invasion”
In 1951, President Harry Truman’s Commission on Migratory Labor issued a report warning that illegal immigration had reached unprecedented levels.
“The magnitude … has reached entirely new levels in the past 7 years,” the report stated. “In its newly achieved proportions, it is virtually an invasion.”
The language helped fuel public alarm.
Newspapers published stories emphasizing border crossings and immigration raids. Government officials promoted highly visible enforcement actions. Reports often exaggerated the effectiveness and reach of the Border Patrol, creating an impression that the nation was under siege. Calls for action intensified.
Courtesy of the Library of Congress
In 1951, Truman’s Commission on Migratory Labor warned that unauthorized immigration from Mexico had reached entirely new levels and described the situation as an “invasion.”
Courtesy of UCLA Library
Mexican workers await legal employment in the United States, Mexicali, Mexico, February 1954. By 1954, immigration from Mexico had grown so rapidly.
Courtesy of the Eisenhower Presidential Library
On June 9, 1954, the Eisenhower administration launched Operation Wetback, one of the largest immigration enforcement campaigns in American history.
Courtesy of Harry S. Truman Library & Museum
Lt. Gen. Joseph M. Swing, Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. He oversaw one of the largest immigration enforcement operations in U.S. history.
Courtesy of the U.S. Border Patrol Museum
Immigrants packed into trucks during Operation Wetback, June 9, 1954. While the operation targeted unauthorized immigrants, U.S. citizens were also included.
Courtesy of University of Texas at Arlington Libraries
Mexican workers in Texas, early 1950s. The highly publicized enforcement campaign prompted many migrants to leave on their own before they could be apprehended.
Operation Wetback
On June 9, 1954, under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, INS Commissioner General Joseph Swing announced Operation Wetback.
Immigration agents conducted raids across the Southwest, targeting farms, neighborhoods, transportation centers, and workplaces. Hundreds of thousands of people were apprehended or pressured into leaving the country.
The operation was presented as a campaign against undocumented immigration. In practice, legal residents and American citizens were also caught up in the sweeps. Individuals were sometimes detained based on appearance, language, or assumptions about their status. Speed often mattered more than careful verification.
The government celebrated the operation as a success. Many of those affected remembered it differently.
A Temporary “Victory”
Operation Wetback reduced unauthorized immigration in the short term. It did not solve the underlying problem.
American agriculture continued to rely on Mexican labor. Employers still needed workers. Economic conditions that encouraged migration remained unchanged.
When the Bracero Program ended in 1964, unauthorized immigration increased once again.
The campaign had treated migration as an enforcement problem. The forces driving migration never disappeared. Labor shortages, political pressure, and public fear transformed workers into targets.
And despite what officials claimed, they did not just target undocumented immigrants.
Courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution
Braceros being sprayed with DDT, 1956. The Bracero Program promised protections for workers, but many experienced degrading treatment.
Courtesy of Oregon State University
As labor shortages spread across the country, Mexican workers became essential to many American farms. They remain so today.