Hanford native, Trump's labor secretary visits Clovis to talk immigrant workers, job training

CLOVIS, Calif. (KFSN) -- During her first trip to California as labor secretary, Lori Chavez-DeRemer visited a familiar place on Friday: the Central Valley.

"It's nice to be home," she said. "Nice to be home."

The secretary sat down for a roundtable at Wawona Frozen Foods in Clovis to hear about the region's Good Job workforce development program.

"Being a part of a team, being in charge of their personal safety and the safety of others. They get all of that while getting the technical knowledge," Stephen Avila said of the program.

The Valley workforce is personal for the secretary. She grew up in Hanford and remembered packing peaches as her first job.

In 1986, she graduated from Hanford High and earned a business degree from Fresno State.

She rose through local politics in Oregon and then landed in Congress. Now a member of President Trump's Cabinet, she oversees labor nationwide...

"About 9,000 jobs came online," she said. "228,000 jobs last (month), but 9,000 in manufacturing."

The secretary's visit comes on the eve of President Trump's 100th day in office. She hinted that the next hundred days of the Trump presidency will be what she described as even more exciting.

"I really call him the president of the American worker. Because this is his focus, and it's exactly why he nominated me to do this job, to change the way we do business in this country," Secretary Chavez-DeRemer said.

But as the secretary brought the president's message to town, some Valley workers are concerned about recent immigration raids.

Federal data shows nearly half of California's farm workers could be undocumented. Thousands are here in the Valley.

Border Czar Tom Homan has said, "No one's off the table."

"We talk about the visa program. I know that we're talking about year-round when we're talking about agriculture. Secretary Noem and I will be having these meetings," Secretary Chavez-DeRemer said.

She suggested a new program could help immigrant farmworkers.

"We don't want to displace the American worker, but we certainly need to supplement and complement American businesses where they need it most. We know there's a lot of agricultural industries all across the country - Very finite amount of time to get products in and out, and we need to workforce to do that."

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