Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm Workers union, died of cancer Oct. 28 at the age of 96.
Alongside fellow UFW leader Cesar Chavez, Huerta was the face of farmworker strikes and boycotts in the 1960s and 1970s and served as UFW vice president for 37 years. She was also known as an immigrant rights and women’s rights campaigner. She was a prominent figure in California Democratic Party politics and was with Robert F. Kennedy when he was assassinated in 1968 after winning the California presidential primary.
Huerta is said to have originated the chant “Sí se puede,” which has become commonplace at union and civil rights rallies. (A Spanish phrase, it means roughly “yes we can”)
She received many honors for her contributions. President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012. In 2018, California passed a law proclaiming April 10, her birthday, as “Dolores Huerta Day.” The Oregon Legislature did the same the following year.
In March 2026, Huerta acknowledged to the New York Times that she had been raped by Chavez and had two children by him who were given up for adoption. The revelation came as the paper was substantiating accounts that Chavez had groomed and sexually abused underage girls. Chavez died in 1993.
Even into her 90s and in the last months of her life Huerta continued to campaign, appearing at rallies against cuts to food stamps and protesting federal immigration actions.
In a statement released the day she died, the national AFL-CIO said Huerta “will forever be a shining example of the best of the labor movement, embodying the fighting spirit of our unions and workers for generations.”
