Dolores Huerta, United Farm Workers co-founder and labor organizer, dies at 96

Dolores Huerta, the labor organizer who co-founded the farmworker movement with César Chávez and coined the rallying cry "Sí se puede," died Wednesday at her home in Bakersfield, California. She was 96.

The Anchorage Daily News reported that the Dolores Huerta Foundation announced the death and said she was surrounded by family, without giving a cause. Texas Public Radio, carrying a San Antonio Report story, said she died of cancer. ABC7 News Bay Area reported that her family is planning a celebration of life.

Born in New Mexico in 1930, Huerta spent most of her life in California's Central Valley. The Minnesota Reformer, republishing The 19th, reported that she worked as an elementary school teacher before turning to organizing. She met Chávez through the Community Service Organization and co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later merged with a Filipino-led group to form the United Farm Workers. Texas Public Radio dated the union's founding to 1962.

She helped organize the 1965 Delano grape strike and a national table-grape boycott, and was lead negotiator for the resulting contracts, according to the Reformer. The Anchorage Daily News reported she later pushed for pesticide protections and lobbied for the 1986 immigration law that gave legal status to about 2.7 million people. She served as a UFW vice president until 1999.

The Anchorage Daily News reported she was arrested more than 20 times and was badly injured by San Francisco police at a 1988 protest, later receiving an $825,000 settlement. President Barack Obama, who adopted her slogan as "Yes we can," awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.

In 2026, Huerta told The New York Times that Chávez had sexually assaulted her twice in the 1960s, part of a Times investigation reporting a pattern of alleged abuse by Chávez, who died in 1993. "I never talked about it to anybody and the reason I didn't is because I just didn't want to hurt the movement," she said, as quoted by the Reformer. Texas Public Radio reported that San Antonio's City Council then voted to restore César Chávez Boulevard's former name, Durango Boulevard.

Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered flags at the State Capitol lowered to half-staff, ABC7 reported. "She had the kind of energy that was just jaw-dropping. Felt like she was never gonna pass," Newsom said, according to the station.

In 2003, Huerta co-founded the Dolores Huerta Foundation with her daughter Camila Chavez, who serves as executive director, the Reformer reported. She had 11 children.

Compiled by True News from reporting by Anchorage Daily News, ABC7 News Bay Area, Minnesota Reformer and Texas Public Radio. Each outlet's original story is linked below.

Originally published by True News: https://truenews.bagleyenterprises.net/stories/554