Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz has sparked a new immigration debate after arguing that removing Haitians from the United States could have economic consequences that reach far beyond immigrant communities. Her warning was direct: “If Haitians are deported, Americans will pay even higher prices for groceries, health care, housing, and child care.” Her argument is that Haitian immigrants are deeply embedded in essential sectors of the American workforce, and removing large numbers of workers could worsen labor shortages, increase employers’ costs and ultimately leave ordinary consumers paying more.

The statement comes amid continuing political battles over immigration enforcement and the legal status of Haitian nationals living in the United States. Florida is particularly important to that debate because it is home to one of the country’s largest Haitian communities. Many Haitian immigrants have established families, businesses and careers there, while others work in industries already struggling to recruit enough employees. For Wasserman Schultz, that means deportation policy cannot be viewed solely as a border-security issue. She argues that it is also an economic question affecting American employers, workers and consumers.

Her argument rests largely on labor supply. When an industry suddenly loses a significant number of workers, businesses have several choices: hire replacements, increase wages to attract employees, reduce services, automate jobs where possible, or raise prices to cover higher operating costs. In industries where labor is already scarce, replacing thousands of experienced workers quickly can be difficult. That is why immigration policy can potentially affect prices even for Americans who have no direct connection to immigrant communities.

Agriculture and food production provide one example. Immigrant labor has long played an important role in parts of the U.S. food system, including farming, processing, transportation and hospitality. If employers lose workers and cannot replace them quickly, production costs can rise. Those expenses may eventually appear at supermarkets, restaurants and other businesses. Wasserman Schultz’s warning about grocery prices reflects this broader economic argument: reducing the available workforce could make producing and delivering food more expensive.

Health care presents another concern. Immigrants work throughout the health sector, including nursing homes, home-health services and other caregiving positions. These are jobs that can be physically demanding and difficult to fill, particularly as America’s population ages and demand for long-term care increases. Losing workers in communities with large Haitian populations could therefore create staffing problems for facilities and families already struggling to find affordable care.

Child care works in a similar way. Providers depend heavily on workers, making labor one of their largest expenses. Unlike some industries, child-care centers cannot simply replace large numbers of employees with machines or dramatically increase the number of children assigned to each caregiver without running into safety and regulatory limits. When staffing becomes scarce, providers may increase wages to recruit workers, reduce available spaces or raise tuition. Parents can then face higher costs or longer waiting lists.

Housing is more complicated, but Wasserman Schultz’s argument points toward the construction workforce. Immigrants make up a significant portion of workers in construction nationally. If immigration enforcement sharply reduces the number of available construction workers in certain markets, homebuilding projects could become slower or more expensive. In areas already suffering from housing shortages, anything that makes new construction more difficult could place additional pressure on prices and rents.

Critics, however, dispute the broader implication that deportation necessarily means higher costs across all of these sectors. Supporters of stricter immigration enforcement argue that businesses should respond to labor shortages by offering better wages and conditions to American workers rather than depending on immigrant labor. From that perspective, a tighter labor market could benefit some U.S. workers by increasing their bargaining power and forcing employers to compete more aggressively for employees.

There is also a distinction between lawful immigrants, people holding temporary protections and undocumented immigrants. Immigration debates often combine these groups even though their legal circumstances are very different. Haitian nationals in the United States may have arrived through different pathways and may possess different forms of authorization. Any assessment of the economic consequences therefore depends heavily on exactly which population is affected, how many people are removed and how quickly changes occur.

That makes sweeping predictions difficult. Deporting a relatively small number of workers would have a different economic impact from removing hundreds of thousands across multiple states in a short period. Similarly, the consequences would vary depending on whether employers could rapidly find replacement workers. Some businesses might absorb additional costs, while others could pass them directly to consumers.

Wasserman Schultz is nevertheless highlighting a part of immigration policy that often receives less attention than arguments about border security and enforcement: immigrants are also employees, tenants, consumers, taxpayers and business owners. Changing their legal status can create ripple effects through local economies.

Florida could provide an especially significant test of that argument. Haitian Americans have had a substantial presence in South Florida for decades. Haitian-owned businesses, churches and community organizations are woven into the region, while Haitian workers participate in health care, hospitality, construction, transportation and other industries. Large-scale removals would therefore affect not just individual immigrants but employers and communities connected to them.

The debate ultimately comes down to competing ideas about immigration and the labor market. One side argues that enforcing immigration laws must remain the priority even if employers experience short-term disruptions. Supporters believe businesses should adapt by recruiting American workers, increasing wages or investing in productivity.

The other side argues that suddenly removing large numbers of established workers creates economic damage without producing enough replacement labor. They warn that employers will face shortages, services will become harder to provide and consumers will ultimately absorb higher costs.

There may also be effects in both directions. Some workers could benefit from higher wages while some consumers face higher prices. Certain industries could adapt quickly, while labor-intensive sectors could struggle. The economic consequences of immigration enforcement are rarely as simple as either side of the political argument suggests.

For Wasserman Schultz, however, the message is aimed directly at American households. She wants voters to consider immigration enforcement not only in terms of who remains in the country, but also in terms of who prepares food, builds homes, cares for children and assists elderly or sick Americans.

Her warning effectively turns the immigration debate into a kitchen-table question: If thousands of Haitian workers disappear from those industries, who replaces them—and at what cost?

That question may become increasingly important as immigration policy changes move from political promises to real-world implementation. Deportation can remove an individual from the country relatively quickly. Replacing the work that person performed may be considerably more complicated.

Whether Wasserman Schultz’s prediction proves accurate across groceries, health care, housing and child care will depend on the scale of any removals, the legal populations affected and how employers respond. But her statement has introduced a politically uncomfortable question into the debate: could policies intended to reduce immigration ultimately leave American families paying more?