a lot of people want to crack down on illegal immigrants in arizona and other border states believe they re taking jobs away from american workers but is that really true? gary tuchman decided to see how firsthand in a sweltering heat of a california vineyard. reporter: before dawn, migrant laborers in the california desert. despite triple digit temperatures still to come, they wear long sleeves, scarves and bandannas to protect themselves from the sun and the dust. their job today, to pick the purple grapes you ll snack on tomorrow. they re all veterans and they re all mexican, except for me. the rookie american, who is joining them for a full day of work, the only person in short sleeves. the only person who doesn t know what he s doing, but i ve been assigned a partner. benjamin rodriguez has worked in the california fields for 32
preventers as early as sunday. today, the effort was postponed until possibly monday or tuesday because workers need to clean out debris they found in one of the relief wells being drilled. the debris is preventing a final section of pipe casing from being installed. that casing is essential for reinforcing the relief well and keeping it secure during the static kill. tom foreman has more for us tonight. tom? hey, randi. what they want to do is make sure that relief well is ready in case the static kill doesn t work. let s explain the static kill first. they ll pump fluid down into that blow-out preventer we ve heard so much about. this is like that top kill they tried before, down into the line. this fluid is much heavier than the oil and, in theory, it will exert downward pressure on the oil and ultimately stop it. they can do this because with that cap on top, the oil is now at a more constant pressure instead of fluctuating with bursts of gas, bursts of oil that give them a hard
a lot of illegal immigrants. they re believed to hold one out of every ten jobs in this area. so, if you live there and you don t have at least a high school diploma, you could find enough competition for certain very hard, low-skilled jobs that, indeed, you might not even apply for the wage that s being offered, especially once it s been established that those are handled by other people. in other places like say over here in west virginia, they also have very hard, very dirty jobs. like coal mining, for example. all those jobs get filled but almost none of them by illegal immigrants, anderson. so, what kind of jobs are illegal immigrants taking? that s an interesting question. farming is absolutely huge, anderson. pugh says 25% of farm workers are here illegally. and gary was in a state where that type of work is big and it s a state that s heavy with illegal immigrants. 19% of workers in building maintenance or janitorial services are here illegally and restaurant work, it s 12%
for their crackdown on illegal immigrants and their controversial sheriff who says he s just doing the job he was elected to. we go out with my volunteer posse. i have 3,000 volunteer posse, about 400 carry guns. you sound like a cowboy. no. yeah, you know, i do act like a cowboy. but instead of going after horse thieves, i go after car thieves. things have changed. sheriff joe arpaio joins us. also tonight, that fence along the border, a lot of big promises made over the years. a lot of money spent, $2.5 billion. four years gone by so far. the work is mostly done but the fence isn t and it s probably not what you expect.
they, like all the other workers here, won t discuss their immigration status. if you re legal, you would usually seek a less punishing occupation. either way, taxes are taken out of all the paychecks. they each make a base rate of $64 for the day. after taxes it s about $45 for the eight hours. as the hours go by, the workers sing to help make time pass, take their minds off the heat. they re aware many people believe mexican immigrants take away american jobs, but over the years on this ranch [ speaking spanish ] reporter: i asked him how many americans he has seen in his 32 years in the field. he said zero. this is the man who does the hiring in these fields. for 15 years you ve been hiring labor crews to do agricultural work. right. reporter: how many americans have been hired over the 15 or 16 years? none. not one. reporter: has one ever expressed interest? no. not to come and work in the