Bill changes farm worker visa rules and lets some workers stay legal.
H.R. 9535 — Securing Agriculture's Workforce Act of 2026 · Filed by Glenn Thompson (R-PA) · 60 cosponsors · Introduced Jun 30, 2026 · Referred to committee
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What it does
The bill makes it easier for farms to hire workers through the H-2A visa program. It lets some illegal farm workers get legal status. Workers must have worked on farms for 180 days or more in the past two years. The bill sets new rules for worker housing and heat illness safety. It creates one online system for visa forms instead of many separate ones.
Who it affects
Farm workers gain housing rules and heat safety rules. Farm businesses can hire workers faster and face fewer legal risks. U.S. farm workers may face lower wages if more outside workers enter the labor market.
One thing to notice
The bill lets some illegal farm workers become legal, but only farm workers. It also protects farm businesses from legal trouble for hiring illegal workers in the past.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
60 cosponsors: 52 Republicans, 8 Democrats.
- Jun 30, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Jun 30, 2026 — Referred to House Committee on the Judiciary · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
24 groups reported lobbying about this bill. They filed 25 reports from Jun 2026 to Jun 2026.
Those reports show $4,670,742 in lobbying spending. Each report lists about 5 bills. So that money was not all for this bill.
More groups named this bill than 97% of bills with any report.
Glenn Thompson, who sponsored the bill, received $1,043,943 from PACs for the 2026 election.
- Association of Equipment Manufacturers — $810,000 in 1 report
- Cox Enterprises Inc. — $750,000 in 1 report
- American Sugar Alliance — $530,000 in 1 report
- American Farm Bureau Fed — $470,409 in 2 reports
- National Milk Producers Federation — $387,833 in 1 report
Lobbying is legal. These reports show who lobbied about this bill, not what changed.
Words to know
- H-2A visa — A work permit that lets foreign workers come to the U.S. to do farm jobs.
- illegal farm workers — People who work on farms but do not have legal permission to be in the U.S.
- labor market — The supply of workers and the demand for jobs in a certain area or field.
- lobbying — Trying to influence lawmakers about a bill. Companies and groups pay people to do this.
- PACs — Groups that collect money and give it to candidates for office.
- sponsored — To sponsor a bill is to introduce it in Congress and put your name on it.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the full bill text on Jul 5, 2026; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 14,707 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 22, 2026 · page rendered 2026-09-23.
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