Dolores Huerta, the labor organizer who co-founded what became the United Farm Workers and spent decades fighting for farmworkers' rights, has died at 96. Her family announced her death.
The family's announcement came Wednesday, according to KFOX14/CBS4, which reported that relatives shared news of her passing that same day. The New York Times reported she died at her home in Bakersfield. On the cause of death, accounts diverge: the Times reported that Erik Olvera, a spokesman for Huerta's family, said the cause was cancer, while NBC Los Angeles reported that details about a cause of death were not immediately available. Huerta's family requested privacy while they grieve and said plans to recognize her life and legacy would be shared later, according to the San Francisco Standard.
From Central Valley Roots to a Movement
Huerta was born in Dawson, New Mexico, on April 10, 1930, and grew up in California's Central Valley, per the seed reporting. In 1962, she co-founded the National Farm Workers Association alongside César Chávez, an organization that later became the United Farm Workers, the Standard's report notes. The two organizers went on to help lead the 1965 Delano grape strike and the worldwide boycott that followed, drawing national attention to the treatment of farmworkers.
Huerta served as vice president of the United Farm Workers until 1999, according to NBC Los Angeles. The Associated Press described her simply as a United Farmworkers co-founder and civil rights icon in its own obituary coverage. The Los Angeles Times framed her legacy around helping launch and guide the nation's first enduring labor union for poor farmworkers. Huerta coined the rallying cry “¡Sí Se Puede!”
A Lifetime of Advocacy, On and Off the Picket Line
Huerta was arrested 22 times over the course of her nonviolent protests, the Standard reported. Her activism was formally recognized in 2012, when President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Beyond the fields, her work expanded into women's rights, Democratic Party politics and community organizing, according to the Los Angeles Times, and her advocacy also extended to immigration reform, per the Standard.
Huerta founded the Dolores Huerta Foundation, which NBC Los Angeles reported began in 2002 and continues to focus on community-based organizing along with state and national issues. The foundation's current work includes a Peace & Justice Cultural Center in Kern County, where groundbreaking has already taken place. Turnto23 reported that the $34.8 million project is meant to support community organizing, civic education and cultural preservation, with completion expected in January 2027.
A Legacy Carried Forward
Huerta's death marks the loss of a leader in the American farmworker movement, a movement that reshaped labor organizing and Chicano civil rights advocacy nationwide. Her family's request for privacy leaves many details of a public memorial still to come, but the institutions she built, from the union that became the UFW to the foundation bearing her name, are set to carry her work into Bakersfield's next chapter.
