Lawsuit over truck driver work visa exploitation quietly resolved

A South African man was brought to the U.S. to perform agricultural work. Instead, he claims he was forced to drive a truck, exposing the exploitation of work visa programs. The lawsuit that followed has ended.

Carel Hanekom arrived in Rake, Iowa, in July 2021 to work for Kuchenbecker Excavating. Coming from South Africa, he entered the U.S. on an H-2A visa, which is for agricultural workers. The work visa was good from January 2021 through August 2021.

Despite Hanekom being brought in for agricultural work, Kuchenbecker Excavating owner Kenneth Kuchenbecker had him drive a truck hauling construction material. Such work requires an H-2B work visa.

Part of the alleged scheme allowed Kuchenbecker to pay Hanekom a much lower wage. Both H-2A and H-2B work visas require the employer to pay the prevailing wage determined by the Department of Labor.

At the time, the wage for a truck driver was about $25 an hour. Because Hanekom was falsely hired on an H-2A visa, he was paid the prevailing wage for an agricultural worker instead. That rate was $17 an hour.

Adding insult to injury, Hanekom had to pay for his own meals while driving long distances, which often had him staying at hotels. The H-2A work visa program requires the employer to provide workers with three meals a day or access to cooking and kitchen facilities.

Kuchenbecker’s alleged H-2A exploitation didn’t stop at undercutting wages.

To get around the time limit, he would shuffle workers between his business and another operated by his daughter, H&S Farms.

The scheme was simple. Kuchenbecker would apply for work visas for temporary work. Whatever the end date was for those visas would be the start date for visas acquired by H&S Farms.

Even though H-2A work visas are good for no more than one year, Hanekom drove a truck for Kuchenbecker for about two years. He would work for Kuchenbecker from January to August and H&S Farms from August to January. That would give off the appearance of temporary work despite Hanekom performing the same truck driving job.

Hanekom was not the only one. According to a lawsuit filed by Hanekom, the two companies filed more than 12 H-2A applications for South African workers exclusively from 2018 to 2023. More than 40 South African workers left their jobs before the end of the contracts due to misrepresentation of job duties.

Last April, Kuchenbecker Excavation and H&S Farms resolved the dispute out of court. Gold Opportunities International, the company Kuchenbecker and his daughter used to recruit the South African workers, lost its bid to be removed from the case. On Oct. 8, the case was dismissed after Golden Opportunities settled the case outside the courtroom.

More details of the case can be found here.

Work visas under scrutiny

The resolution of the case came shortly after the federal government paused all work visas for truck drivers.

On Aug. 12, three people in Florida were killed after a truck driver made an illegal U-turn. The truck driver and his passenger were both from India, and the latter was here illegally, according to the Department of Homeland Security. The driver initially obtained his CDL in Washington state and had it reissued in California. The incident prompted a wave of action from federal and state governments.

Later that month, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced the U.S. would be pausing the issuance of work visas for commercial truck drivers. That includes H-2B, E-2 and EB-3 visas. During the suspension, the government will review the screening and vetting process used to determine qualifications for those visas.

Just a few days prior, the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association had asked Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to suspend states’ authority to issue non-domiciled CDLs. In September, the Department of Transportation set stricter requirements for non-domiciled CDLs.

Since then, numerous bills have been introduced in Congress addressing non-domiciled CDLs and English-language proficiency. Meanwhile, Florida is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to order California and Washington state to cease issuing CDLs to non-U.S. citizens or those who are not lawful permanent residents. LL

Land Line Senior Editor Mark Schremmer contributed to this story.