OLYMPIA — A small group rallied Tuesday at the Capitol to protest Washington’s overtime law for agriculture, criticizing it as foisting bad economics on farmers and farmworkers.

The Center for Latino Leadership and Save Family Farming organized the protest. Few farmworkers attended. President Trump’s executive order to deport all illegal immigrants kept workers away, Chelan, Wash., farmworker Juan Garcia said.

“They’re afraid of the new administration and what’s going on,” he said.

The handful who came said the overtime law, requiring employers to pay all farmworkers time-and-a-half after 40 hours in a week, has cut their hours and paychecks.

Garcia, a farm foreman, said he once worked about 50 hours a week, now it’s sometimes fewer than 40. He said he crams more work into the reduced hours and works part time at Wal-Mart.

“It’s affected me bigtime,” he said. “I knew it wasn’t going to help.”

The Legislature phased in overtime for all farmworkers after the state Supreme Court ruled in 2020 that dairy workers were entitled to overtime. Last year was the first time the threshold was 40 hours.

Economically, the law backfired on farmworkers, said Maia Espinoza, executive director of the Center for Latino Leadership.

“It boils down to a financial issue,” she said. “They’re not making as much money as they used to.”

Grant County tree fruit grower Kent Karstetter said some of his workers get overtime, such as the ones who irrigate and apply pesticides, but he’s reduced others to fewer than 40 hours a week and looked to hire more seasonal foreign farmworkers.

Employees who worked 47 hours a week during harvest in 2023 were held to 39 hours in 2024. Other expenses besides labor are up, too, and he can’t demand more for his fruit, Karstetter said.

“Last year, I got zero for some of my apples, and I still had to cover my operating costs,” he said. “I can’t pay everybody overtime.

“I’m not happy. Workers aren’t happy,” Karstetter said. “We’re all interconnected.”

The sparse rally contrasted with a boisterous rally that drew about 300 farmworkers last year. The number of Republican lawmakers who dropped by surpassed the number of farmworkers.

Republicans in the House and Senate have introduced bills to raise the threshold to 50 hours for up to 12 weeks a year. The bills have some Democratic co-sponsors, but it would be a victory of sorts for either bill to get a hearing, much less pass this year.

Moses Lake Republican Tom Dent, who introduced the House bill, told rally goers “If we can get a hearing, I want you all to come to testify.”

In an interview, Dent acknowledged the uphill climb he’s on. He said he’ll stick with it.

“We know there are thousands out there just like these people here, and they have the ability to convince us there needs to be a change,” he said.