Nationwide efforts underway to rebrand César Chavez Day after abuse allegations
Efforts to rebrand César Chavez Day are spreading across the United States ahead of March 31, as elected leaders and civil rights groups respond to allegations that Chavez sexually abused women and girls during the 1960s. The changes are taking multiple forms, from state-level holiday renaming to local event rebranding, with supporters and organizers describing a mix of disappointment and anger as they try to decide what should be honored and how.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill on Thursday that renamed César Chavez Day as Farmworkers Day. In Minnesota, lawmakers voted this week to end the Chavez holiday, signaling that some states are moving away from commemorating the day under his name.
In other places, communities are altering how they mark the holiday without stopping the events entirely. In Tucson, Arizona, organizers billed last weekend’s celebration as a “community and labor fair” rather than a Chavez-centered event, and in Grand Junction, Colorado, organizers switched to calling the gathering the “Sí, Se Puede Celebration.” In El Paso, Texas, officials planned to mark Tuesday as Community and Labor Heritage Day.
Organizers who are continuing events say their focus has broadened to labor rights rather than personal legacy. The Arizona coalition organizing the annual Chavez and Dolores Huerta holiday effort urged supporters to keep showing up for one another, saying in a social media post that “this movement is bigger than a name or one person,” adding, “No single individual defines it. … We, the working people, do.”
The process has been difficult for supporters balancing the movement’s history with the allegations. Jose Luis Chavez, who is the founder and president of the committee that has organized the César Chavez Celebration for Mesa County, Colorado, for the past decade, described the emotional impact in terms of personal betrayal, saying, “It was a personal hurt and a betrayal,” and, “I think that’s what my committee was feeling, and I think when we look at our community here, that is what people are still feeling.”
As organizers reconsider branding, some say they are trying to preserve what they see as the movement’s purpose—education and recognition of marginalized communities—while acknowledging that feelings are mixed even among those committed to continuing. In Grand Junction, the annual celebration has evolved into a gathering that includes music, food, classic cars and high school students taking the stage to accept scholarships, and the committee said canceling the event was not an option for its members.
According to the AP report, the Grand Junction celebration’s logo was adjusted to include the words “Sí, se puede,” a rallying cry coined by Dolores Huerta that translates as “Yes, it can be done.” Organizers used social media posts to inform attendees that the event would proceed under the new name.
Even as some communities continue labor-focused programming, state and local changes extend beyond events to schools, streets and other public sites named for Chavez. The reporting described renaming efforts underway for dozens of those locations, including a national monument in Keene, California, as communities confront how public commemoration should be handled.
In New Mexico, Albuquerque’s annual march had already been canceled earlier for unrelated reasons, but leaders in the city are now beginning the process of sorting out whether public spaces should keep Chavez and Huerta names. City Councilor Joaquín Baca, whose district includes roads named after both César Chavez and Huerta, said the outreach and decision-making process will take time and include public engagement.
Baca said communications with city leaders included both demands that everything related to Chavez be removed and requests for a broader approach to recognizing farmworkers and other laborers. He said, “It’s every side on every issue within the context of this,” and described the effort as “a lot of listening at this point.”
Sehila Mota Casper, executive director of Latinos in Heritage Conservation, said she expected outcomes to vary by community and emphasized due process as part of the reckoning. She said it’s “due process that’s needed to help grapple with this,” and argued that the process should allow each community to determine what reflects its values. She also framed the historical challenge as a need to tell a “full story,” adding, “So in commemorating or glorifying them, we have to be able to acknowledge the good and the bad and take that as it comes … but also understand that we can’t gloss over history,” and, “We can’t simplify it just to make it easy. We have to be able to talk about it.”