Dolores Huerta with Chicago hotel workers at the Drake Hotel, November 13, 2025 (Photo by Julio Ricardo Varela/The Latino Newsletter)
Earlier on Wednesday, the family of Dolores Huerta posted that the community leader and civil rights icon had died.
“We are deeply saddened to announce that our beloved mother, Dolores Huerta, has passed away today at the age of 96,” the post read. “As you can imagine, this is an incredibly difficult time for us, and we ask for privacy as we grieve this incredible loss to our family. We know that many of you around the world share in our mourning, and we will be following up on plans to recognize and celebrate her incredible life and legacy.”
Right now, our newsfeeds are filling up with beautiful tributes to Dolores.
In the hours since the news, several Latino organizations have shared public statements. We are sure that more will be shared. Here are a few of the ones we have received this afternoon at The Latino Newsletter. Some of these statements have been excerpted.
Congressional Hispanic Caucus
Dolores Huerta defied definition. To call her a leader, an activist, or a trailblazer is to barely begin to capture the magnitude of her legacy. She was a national and international icon whose courage, conviction, and relentless pursuit of justice helped change the course of history. From the labor movement to the broader fight for civil rights, Dolores challenged injustice in all its forms and empowered generations to demand dignity, equality, and opportunity.
Her legacy transcends borders, generations, and movements. She helped shape the conscience of our nation and demonstrated that the fight for justice requires both the courage to challenge the status quo and the conviction to never give up. For Latinos, her contributions are profound. For all Americans, her life stands as a testament to the power of collective action and the enduring promise of a more just and equitable society.
On behalf of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, we honor Dolores Huerta’s extraordinary life, her historic contributions, and the generations she inspired to carry the struggle forward. Her spirit will forever live in our hearts, in our history, and in the ongoing fight for justice for all.
Dolores, your legacy is our responsibility. Your fight continues through all of us who believe in a better future. Rest in power, hermana.
Julián Castro, CEO, Latino Community Foundation
Dolores changed the course of American history when she began fighting for farmworkers in California's Central Valley. Because of her courage, determination, and skill as an organizer and leader, farmworkers secured better wages and safer living and working conditions. She showed the nation that any person, anywhere, has a role to play in making social change.
"Dolores was an inspiration to me and our entire team at the Latino Community Foundation, lending her wisdom and her grace throughout the years in our collective work to unleash the civic and economic power of Latinos nationwide.
Dolores was a force for good and a force of nature. We are especially mindful today of the words she emblazed on our hearts for generations: ¡Sí, se puede!
Friends of the National Museum of the American Latino
Dolores devoted her life to fighting for the dignity of all workers and underrepresented communities. She fought for better wages and working conditions, helping lead the historic grape boycott that brought national attention to the plight of farmworkers.
Through the Dolores Huerta Foundation, she helped others become organizers and leaders in their own communities. She understood that progress means finding a voice for people and communities who had historically never had one.
Erica Bernal-Martinez, CEO, NALEO and NALEO Educational Fund
Dolores taught generations of Latinos a simple truth: our voices matter most when we use them. For more than 70 years, she organized farmworkers, families, and communities to demand a seat at the table, and then take it. ¡Sí, se puede! began as a rallying cry. It became a call to civic action that lives on in every Latino voter, organizer, and public servant.
Roman Palomares, LULAC National President and Board Chair
Dolores Huerta proved that the people who feed America deserve the full protection of its laws. She did not wait for permission to lead. She organized, she negotiated, and she won. LULAC calls on the president and Congress to declare a national day of remembrance for Dolores Huerta. LULAC also urges the president to order flags lowered to half-staff in her honor.
Juan Proaño, CEO, LULAC
Her life is a lesson for every generation. Our duty now is to carry her work forward with the same courage and discipline she gave it for more than seven decades.
Sonia V. Diaz, President, Hispanic Public Relations Association
For nearly eight decades, Dolores organized, advocated, and fought for the dignity of workers, women, immigrants, and communities whose voices were too often ignored. She understood something fundamental to our profession: words have power, but their greatest impact comes when they move people to act.
As communicators, we have a responsibility to carry that work forward. To speak when others are silenced. To tell the stories that others overlook. And to use our platforms to defend the rights and opportunities that leaders like Dolores spent a lifetime fighting to secure.
María Teresa Kumar, Voto Latino Co-Founder
Today, the world lost a civil rights giant. Dolores Huerta dedicated her entire life, until her final days, to championing and fighting injustice for everyone, no matter who they were or where they came from. She will be remembered not only for her heroic stories throughout the labor movement, but for the path she forged for people in my generation and the generations to come. Dolores always saw the good in people. To me, she was not only a mentor, a strategist, and a friend.
She always showed up.
At Voto Latino’s Power Summit, she was the person who stayed until the last minute. She didn’t see it as a waste of time. She was ancestoring our next generation of Latino leaders. She spoke with everyone who approached her, and with all the grace in the world, she listened and guided them.
Dolores saw the value and spirit in young people before the rest of the world was ready to. Because of her, our community has been empowered to be our own advocates.
That is the Dolores Huerta we’re honoring today.
Rosario Dawson, Voto Latino Co-Founder
Dolores Huerta was a mentor and a beacon of light to so many of us, in our country and across the world. Her guidance transcended generations, nationalities, and borders. She touched so many people as she fought for justice, peace, and equality. She never backed down.
Dolores centered her life around doing good in this world and around the deep-rooted belief in leaving it better than we found it. It is now up to us to carry her legacy forward.
¡Sí, se puede, Dolores! May we carry your light and joy as we forge the path for new generations.
At The Latino Newsletter, we had the honor of featuring Dolores as a guest on our podcast in November 2025.
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