Food prices rose 0.5% in October, outpacing overall inflation, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Grocery prices climbed 0.4%, and fresh vegetables, among the most labor-intensive crops to harvest, jumped 2.2% in a single month.

Global Refuge, one of the nation’s largest nonprofits serving refugees and other immigrants, warned that federal immigration policy is adding to the cost of putting food on the table. The administration has itself warned of the risk. In an October 2025 rule, the Labor Department wrote that labor shortages were “threatening the stability of domestic food production and prices for U.S. consumers.”

“The affordability crisis and the immigration crackdown are two sides of the same coin,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, President and CEO of Global Refuge. “You cannot purge the people who pick, pack and process our food and expect prices to come down. Fewer hands in the supply chain means fewer goods on the shelves and higher prices at the register.”

READ THE ARTICLE AT GLOBAL REFUGE