South Texas builders press officials for action as rampant ICE raids roil construction sites and strain the region’s economy

More than 200 people gathered inside the Brookhaven Event Center in Pharr for a South Texas Builders Association meeting on Monday, aimed at connecting the construction industry with elected officials to share their concerns about immigration enforcement raids that have detained workers on the job. 

Fear rises as legal visa holders get detained

“We need to defend our industry. What’s going on now is affecting every major part of our industry, from lumber companies to lenders,” said Ronnie Cavazos, president of The Structure Team, a home builder based in McAllen. “Business is down significantly. If we continue on this trajectory, we will see a lot of businesses fail.” 

Cavazos said the issue is especially close to home in South Texas because many residents are naturalized U.S. citizens or have mixed immigration status families. Some workers have been pulled off job sites only to be released later because they did have legal work visas. 

Cavazos criticized the federal government’s treatment of immigrants. 

“The immigrant should be celebrated, treated with dignity, and allowed to work and provide for their families. They are the American dream. All we ask is that the government let us work,” Cavazos said. 

Project delays ripple through suppliers and builders

The South Texas Builders Association had invited elected officials at the local, state, and federal level and even representatives of Homeland Security to attend the conversation to work on solutions. But about half of the chairs for city leaders, state officials, and congressional leaders were empty – including the city of Pharr. It was not immediately clear why. 

The new mayor of Edinburg, Omar Ochoa, said that it’s difficult for local officials to influence federal policies. 

“On the local level, there’s very little that city officials can do…on the ICE raids, the federal government cracking down on job sites,” Ochoa said. 

The South Texas Builders Association added they are not against Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents doing their jobs, but are concerned about them crossing into private property and conducting immigration raids during the work day since it’s a civil, not criminal issue. 

Some attendees suggested that cities across the Rio Grande Valley could enforce road closures and fencing around active construction sites with signs to keep ICE from entering without a warrant. 

“If it’s a request by the builders for a city ordinance that’s an impediment, we will look to see why that’s the case. If it’s a health, safety concern, maybe the city can’t change it,” Ocoha said, but promised to explore the idea with the city government. 

The cities of Weslaco and Donna are actively exploring and supporting that method of fencing. For example, Weslaco’s Police Department refuses to enforce immigration policy when contacted by ICE.

Cities weigh fencing and limits on warrantless entry

McAllen Mayor Pro-Tem and Commissioner Victor “Seby” Haddad has also worked in commercial lending for Lone Star National Bank for the past two decades. Haddad said he’s even witnessed legal visa holders self-deporting back to Mexico for fear of detention – even by mistake. 

“That is not what we want for our community,” Haddad said. 

Emigdio Villanueva, Jr., CEO of Villa Homes in Mission, has been in the construction industry for almost four decades. 

“Many people do not want to go to work; for that reason we struggle to move projects forward,” Villanueva, Jr. said in Spanish. “We have seen that sometimes when the [ICE] raids are carried out, one person does not bring his or her papers with them at that time. Many times, people are arrested, but after taking them they investigate more, and people have been allowed to leave. But sometimes it happens in the middle of work. The foundation, especially, [can’t be stopped] because the cement dries out and can no longer be worked on; those are seriously expensive consequences.” 

Villanueva would love to see more students in local high schools learn vocational trades, but also a more functional work visa program hashed out by politicians in Washington D.C. 

“A type of legislation that can support [visa holders] where they can be working here and we can support them,” he said. 

Lumber sales have been down across South Texas, said Isaac Smith, co-owner of Matt’s Building Materials, who donated the event space for the meeting. 

“We’re just struggling to get the lumber out the door. We have a lot of projects that have been postponed,” Smith said. “It affects us tremendously, and I know it’s affecting our competitors and other businesses. It’s only going to trickle down and get worse.” 

VMK Materials operates construction supply stores from Mission to Brownsville with 100 employees. 

“Over the last few months, we’ve seen that the residential sector of our business has definitely declined substantially. Commercial and industrial is slow, but it’s continued,” said Victor Garza, president of VMK Materials. “Think about all the people who are impacted by that. If builders aren’t building homes, they don’t need concrete. They don’t need sheetrock installers.” 

Labor shortages deepen as visa holders avoid job sites

Martin Villanueva has worked in the South Texas construction industry for the past 40 years. 

Villanueva was born in Reynosa, Mexico, just across the Rio Grande River, but immigrated to the U.S. looking for work. He began working as a dishwasher in a restaurant for several years, but it didn’t pay much money. But by his early 20s, he started learning building trades and became a house framer. 

Now decades later, in his 60s, he’s the founder of Villanueva Construction, a McAllen-based builder, which specializes in custom single-family homes. 

Villanueva remembers when ICE agents conducted workplace raids in Texas during the George W. Bush administration in 2005. Back then, he said, the industry was facing a crisis. 

“Those [businesses] who had money survived, but those who were starting [in construction] had to stop, and the entire economy was compromised,” he said in Spanish. 

But the crackdown is more widespread under President Donald Trump. 

“Those workers who have legal working documents are being offered more money to work up North. So we are running out of workers,” Villanueva said. 

The biggest bottleneck is with subcontractors that lack documentation for their crews. General contractors like himself only hire individuals with legal authorization to work. But even those with legal work visas living in Mexico along the Texas-Mexico border are less likely to show up for work for fear of being detained and questioned on the international bridge. 

Villanueva said that while there are fewer construction tradespeople available right now, it’s not affecting his business as much because the economy is slowing down – he’s gone from building sixty houses a year to finishing this year with twelve. 

To try and prevent Immigration and Customs Enforcement from detaining Mexican nationals with legal work authorization in a widespread sweep and delaying the construction process, builders are working more collaboratively. 

“What happens is when we spend $2,000 for a fence, because the subcontractors ask us to, but ICE still gets in and the customer simply gets a more expensive house [when it’s finished],” he said. “They are taking people who are working honestly.”