Outside the Beltway

Cesar Chavez Was a Serial Child Rapist

The iconic labor leader had a dark secret.

James Joyner · Thursday, March 19, 2026 · 6 comments

NYT reporters Manny Fernandez and Sarah Hurtes have uncovered a major scandal involving a civil rights icon who died 33 years ago.

“Cesar Chavez, a Civil Rights Icon, Is Accused of Abusing Girls for Years“

Ana Murguia remembers the day the man she had regarded as a hero called her house and summoned her to see him. She walked along a dirt trail, entered the rundown building, passed his secretary and stepped into his office.

He locked the door, as he always did when he called her, and told her how lonely he had been. He brought her onto the yoga mat that he often used in his office for meditation, kissed her and pulled her pants down. “Don’t tell anyone,” he told her afterward. “They’d get jealous.”

The man, Cesar Chavez, one of the most revered figures in the Latino civil rights movement, was 45. She was 13. Ms. Murguia said she was summoned for sexual encounters with him dozens of times over the next four years.

Recently, more than 50 years later, Ms. Murguia learned that a street near her home in the Central California city of Bakersfield was in the process of being renamed. City officials want to name it in honor of her abuser.

Cesar Chavez Boulevard.

Ms. Murguia and another woman, Debra Rojas, say that Mr. Chavez sexually abused them for years when they were girls, from around 1972 to 1977. He was in his 40s and had become a powerful, charismatic figure who captured global attention as a champion of farmworker rights.

The two women have not shared their stories publicly before, and an investigation by The New York Times has uncovered extensive evidence to support their accusations and those raised by several other women against Mr. Chavez, the United Farm Workers co-founder who died in 1993 at the age of 66.

The questions raised by The Times about Mr. Chavez, one of the most consequential figures in Mexican American history, immediately prompted organizations with ties to him to try to distance themselves. The U.F.W. canceled its annual celebrations honoring Mr. Chavez, a response to what the union he once led called “profoundly shocking” accusations.

Marches to honor Mr. Chavez were called off in Austin, Texas; Tucson, Ariz.; and elsewhere. Officials in multiple states said they would consider renaming the scores of streets and schools named in his honor. “None of us knew,” Gov. Gavin Newsom of California said on Wednesday, noting that he planned to discuss with legislators whether to rename Cesar Chavez Day on March 31.

Ms. Murguia and Ms. Rojas, both of whom are now 66, were the daughters of longtime organizers who had marched in rallies alongside Mr. Chavez. He used the privacy of his California office to frequently molest Ms. Murguia, she said. He had known her since she was 8 years old. She became so traumatized that she attempted to end her life multiple times by the age of 15.

[…]

The abuse allegations appear to be part of a larger pattern of sexual misconduct by Mr. Chavez, much of which has never been publicly revealed. The Times investigation found that Mr. Chavez also used many of the women who worked and volunteered in his movement for his own sexual gratification. His most prominent female ally in the movement, Dolores Huerta, said in an interview that he sexually assaulted her, a disclosure she has never before made publicly.

Many of the women stayed silent for decades, both out of shame and for fear of tarnishing the image of a man who has become the face of the Latino civil rights movement, his image on school murals and his birthday a state holiday in California.

The findings are based on interviews with more than 60 people, including his top aides at the time, his relatives and former members of the U.F.W., which he co-founded with Ms. Huerta and Gilbert Padilla. The Times reviewed hundreds of pages of union records, confidential emails and photographs, as well as hours of audio recordings from U.F.W. board meetings.

The accounts of abuse from Ms. Murguia and Ms. Rojas were independently verified through interviews with those they confided in decades ago and in more recent years. Elements of their stories were also corroborated in documents, emails, itineraries and other writings from union organizers, supporters of Mr. Chavez and historians.

There’s a whole lot more at the link, as well as at least two related stories at the paper:

• Pooja Salhotra, Laurel Rosenhall, and Shawn Hubler, “More Cesar Chavez Fallout Expected After Sex Abuse Accusations.”

• Sarah Hurtes and Manny Fernandez, “‘We’re Just Seen as Sex Objects’: Dolores Huerta’s Years in the U.F.W.“

While I’m not familiar with the reporters here, the description of the investigative process is quite compelling, indeed. And there’s simply no way the publisher and editors of the NYT would go forward with such explosive charges against a figure beloved of much of their core readership were they even slightly concerned about the veracity of the allegations.

Needless to say, naming schools and streets—much less a national holiday—in his honor would be inappropriate in light of this information. Ironically, it would not preclude holding high political office.