‘No amnesty.’ That’s what they keep saying, anyhow.

Just to be clear:

No amnesty, no sir, no how.

That’s Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins after President Trump bopped into the Iowa State Fairgrounds to say this about undocumented ag workers:

“If a farmer’s willing to vouch for these people, in some way, Kristi, I think we’re going to have to just say that’s going to be good, right?”

That would be Kristi Noem, homeland security chief in the flak jacket and bling and MAGA cap over there.

The right-wing blather machine screeched. Trump had acknowledged that we need immigrant labor to pick lettuce, milk cows and cut meat. Agribusiness had been pestering the White House over threatening their workforce, and you know how that goes. Grease the squeak.

Rollins took to the lectern to articulate what nearly everyone is thinking: There are plenty of people on Medicaid who could do stoop labor or hack at hogs.

There’s a reason grandma in the nursing home draws Medicaid. She ain’t worth a damn for throwing turkeys off a truck. Nearly all the parents of kids on Hawk-I insurance are employed — it’s just that ag-related work pays chicken feed, even by rural Iowa standards, such that you need subsidized insurance. The people tending your cows can barely afford milk.

Trump hints waivers. Rollins barks “no amnesty.” Chaos and confusion can be useful. It’s Trump’s whole bob-and-weave, his self-proclaimed genius. Is he foolish or crazy?

They keep everyone guessing.

So they ship out a 20-year-old construction worker from West Liberty to Guatemala, and people protest at Cedar Rapids because everyone liked Pascual Pedro. He came to Iowa with his father when he was 13. He was a soccer star. He worked for his grandfather’s siding company. His father was undocumented and was deported. Like father, like son. Pascual was visiting the immigration office as part of his residency requirements and was swept up and out. The family has been in West Liberty for more than 30 years.

No amnesty. Law and order. Except, Trump suggested at the fairgrounds, if the farmers would vouch for the help.

“We want to put the farmer in charge.”

They are drawing up a work program so as to keep the flow of hogs and poultry unmitigated.

It’s a wink and a nod. Right, Kristi? You with me, Brooke?

No amnesty.

Unless the boss vouches. Then it is not amnesty. It is necessary to keep chicken hind quarters at $1.49 per pound.

No farmer could vouch for Pascual. Just a whole community did. So he goes, and it shows that Trump is tough on immigrants.

Sen. Chuck Grassley of the Judiciary Committee always said he would never vote for amnesty. Sen. Joni Ernst is the one who assured Storm Lake there would be no deportation of non-criminal immigrants here. But that is not amnesty, it is just pragmatism.

Trump said he would deport everyone without papers. Now he must create papers for those without in order to keep hungry mouths from not biting him. He said the program would be ready in weeks.

He didn’t mean what he said. Nobody did. That’s why you may assume that the Trump tariffs are bluff and bluster. You want rare earth minerals for your computers? You drop the tariffs with China. Grassley needs potash from Canada? It gets an exemption.

The art of the deal. It’s just another TACO Tuesday.

Ernst can’t afford to see a packinghouse slowdown because of raids. Rep. Ashley Hinson can say that the West Liberty deportee got due process, and everyone can argue about it while business goes on as usual. When we posted a story on social media about federal funding cuts to the Storm Lake school budget, the comments devolved into an argument about racism and immigration within minutes, replete with personal attacks and insults.

Chaos and confusion are the point. They sow fear. It keeps everyone off balance just enough to dance with the devil. Ultimately the truth bears out: We can’t eat without immigrants. Trump admitted it at the fairgrounds. No amnesty except for … well, Ernst winks, we all know that they can’t shut down Storm Lake. Do not confuse that with amnesty: There is no amnesty for Pascual. That must be clear.