01/27/26 The ICE Man Cometh for Livestock Producers

01/27/2026 The ICE Man Cometh for Livestock Producers PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian’s Afternoon Market Update Feed costs are favorable, but a number of major challenges are contributing to cost inflation in the pork and other livestock industries. We all know that hog barns, feedlots, and dairies use a strong component of undocumented immigrants in their labor force. Super-charged Immigration enforcement is no longer a potential threat that is coming…ICE is here and it is having an impact on the labor force used by livestock producers in this region. Workers are gone…disappeared. For example, ICE was reportedly waiting outside the school in Sibley Iowa for the parents to come pick up their kids so they could move on them. Many other cities and counties are reporting visits by ICE with one report of ICE visiting a county jail which is actually where they ought to be checking (Cerro Gordo County). They had none…just American criminals. That is dominantly the case. Hog producers tell me that workers they typically hired to wash barns are gone. Regular employees are absent and replacements are nowhere to be found. There is a critical labor shortage in livestock barns developing in…