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As what had long been known as César Chavez Day arrived on Tuesday, supporters across the country faced a painful new question: how to honor a labor leader whose legacy now collides with allegations of sexual abuse. The debate unfolded even as public recognition tied to Chavez—names, images and commemorations—was being reconsidered in several places after reporting described allegations that he groomed and sexually abused women and young girls.
Antonio Bustamante, who has kept a watercolor of Chavez in his law office in Yuma, Arizona for more than 35 years, said he was still sorting through what the allegations mean for the man he admired. Bustamante, who said he was moved by Chavez as a young organizer and later worked as part of his security team, described the emotional and intellectual challenge of comparing his memories of Chavez with what was “said he did.”
Bustamante said he learned of the allegations when an old friend called to discuss the upcoming report. He said he immediately thought about how other people who had known and admired Chavez would be affected, adding that he now has unanswered questions from his own time by Chavez’s side.
In other parts of the labor community, some leaders argued that the movement’s history cannot be reduced to a single person—even when that person is the face many people associate with the cause. Teresa Romero, president of the United Farm Workers, said the contradiction between Chavez’s legacy and the allegations is unavoidable, describing two “hands” in the same story: one tied to “the man who committed horrible acts” and one tied to the organizer who helped bring “thousands and thousands of people together” to improve conditions for farmworkers.
Romero said the two aspects of that legacy came from the same person, while Sehila Mota Casper, executive director of Latinos in Heritage Conservation, said the farmworker movement was driven by collective effort. Casper said the rights and protections that emerged from the movement belong to “the people that built it,” and she framed a way forward as recognizing Chavez’s role without letting it overshadow other contributions, including those of Dolores Huerta.
Beyond workplaces and community groups, political and government institutions also responded quickly, reshaping how the day was recognized. In the AP report, Colorado made the name change official in the morning, while Nevada’s governor declined to sign a proclamation; in California, Chavez Day remained a recognized state holiday and some state and local government offices were closed.
The changes extended to public celebrations, with the report saying that, within days of the allegations becoming widely known, Chavez statues were removed and events canceled or renamed, including those tied to the March 31 federal holiday. MSI previously reported that some communities were moving to cancel or rename events tied to the day as the allegations came to the forefront.
Some political leaders cited the allegations as part of a broader criticism of Chavez’s progressive legacy. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said Texas would no longer celebrate César Chavez Day, stating that the allegations “undermine the narrative that elevated Chavez as a figure worthy of official state celebration,” while groups such as the nonpartisan Latino Victory Project said the moment should not distract from ongoing civil-rights battles.
Paul Ortiz, a labor history professor at Cornell University and director of graduate studies for Latino Studies, said the legacies connected to Chavez remain “unchanged” and are “all about people power.” For Bustamante, that idea still leaves room for an “asterisk” next to Chavez’s name, a distinction he said could coexist with a continued effort to honor Chavez’s accomplishments—while acknowledging that supporters are now grappling with the hardest part of the story.
Bustamante said he thinks there is a “good chance” the allegations are true, while also describing how he struggles with unresolved questions tied to his own proximity to Chavez. He said the challenge now is whether the public can look beyond the allegations to recognize what Chavez achieved, and he called that reconciliation “the tough part.”