DELANO, Calif. — Nearly six decades after civil rights leader Cesar Chavez ended a 25-day fast at Memorial Park in Delano, thousands marched this week for three miles to call for the continued protection of workers – and for the protection of immigrants.
The Monday march took place on the 32nd anniversary of Chavez’s death.
It was centered around what is now known as The Forty Acres – the birthplace of the farmworker movement. Chavez co-founded the United Farm Workers in 1962.
Teresa Romero leads the organization today.
“We’re here to do two things: One, to honor Cesar Chavez and his legacy. But number two is to recognize the workers, the immigrant workers, that contribute so much to our economy,” she told KVPR.
Alejandro Martinez is one of those workers.
He works for the nation’s largest sweet potato grower, A.V. Thomas Produce. The farm near Merced recently won a contract with the UFW that includes paid holidays and sick days for workers. Those are benefits Martinez says he never had before.
“It’s liberating,” he said, in Spanish. “We want everyone to see, ‘Yes, you can.’”
But he added that the threat of deportation of people without legal status and recent U.S. Border Patrol raids in Kern County have sown fear across the San Joaquin Valley. Recent immigration enforcement actions have cast a cloud of uncertainty over immigrant workers.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta has vowed to keep fighting for immigrants’ rights in court. He addressed a sea of marchers during this week’s event.
“I will use the full force of the law, the full force of my office, to defend and protect immigrants; to defend and protect workers; to defend and protect unions,” said Bonta, who grew up in La Paz, home to the Cesar Chavez National Monument.
Chavez’s legacy of advocating for worker rights hasn’t dimmed even decades after his death. And this week, two California lawmakers introduced legislation to expand that legacy within the National Park Service.
Sen. Alex Padilla and Rep. Raul Ruiz are proposing to establish the Cesar E. Chavez and the Farmworker Movement National Historical Park. It would cover sites that are significant to the farmworker rights movement in California and Arizona.
“Our National Park system should memorialize the diverse legacy and culture of all Americans and give farm workers the recognition they deserve,” Padilla said in a statement.
The bill would also seek to create a 300-mile national historic trail, mirroring the route farm workers took from Delano to the state capital in 1966.
