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Wine country’s undocumented workers can’t get federal aid

In the wake of the record breaking California wildfires that ravaged Sonoma and Napa, there’s one community that’s been overlooked: undocumented workers. While U.S. citizens and legal immigrants qualify for FEMA aid and often have insurance, individuals without social security numbers do not.

Read: Meet the inmates risking their lives to fight California wildfires

The economy in this part of California is heavily dependent on hand labor, with immigrants filling the workforce in industries like tourism, agriculture and wine. Supervisors in Sonoma County worry that the loss of thousands of homes will compound the housing crisis and thus force these families to leave the area. To fill this void, organizations like the Graton Day Labor Center have created a fund called Undocufund, to support these undocumented workers as they begin to rebuild their lives.

This segment originally aired Oct. 20, 2017, on VICE News Tonight on HBO.

Read: California’s wildfires rip through wine country and into suburbia