With the administration of President Donald Trump ramping up immigration raids targeting Farm Workers, 95-year-old Union Activist Dolores Huerta - who co-founded the country's largest Agricultural Union, the United Farm Workers, more than 60 years ago - is a galvanizing figure for those seeking to fight back. "People are reaching out because they want to do something," she told France 24 during an interview at the headquarters of her Dolores Huerta Foundation in Bakersfield, California. Finding the time to organize and mobilize Workers remains as crucial as ever today, she said. "We've got to be a lot more active, because what's happening right now is so huge. I liken it to what was happening in Germany before Hitler took power," Huerta said. She argues it is essential to prepare the electorate to vote in the 2026 Mid Terms, which could reshape Congress. Both its chambers currently have Republican majorities. "This is the only way that this can be solved," she said. Much has changed since her time as a young Union Leader, but one thing that has never gone away is racism, Huerta said. "I believe that that illness of racism is what has really contaminated our political system," she said. "Trump is actually playing out that racism when he is again putting Immigrants, and mostly People of Color, into the detention centers" with "inhumane conditions," she said. Many have been sent to countries with which they have no connection, Huerta noted, such as the 252 Venezuelans who were sent to a notorious El Salvador prison, before eventually being repatriated to their homeland as part of a political deal. For Huerta, the Republican-led crackdown is "absolutely atrocious... our people have been caught off guard."

To Continue Reading This Labor News Story, Go To: Famed union leader Dolores Huerta urges US to mobilize against Trump

File Photo Courtesy Of The United Farm Workers Union.