Recently, the New York Times published an investigation revealing that Cesar Chavez - co-founder of the United Farm Workers and one of the most celebrated figures in American labor history - groomed and sexually abused girls, and assaulted women over decades. Dolores Huerta, Chavez’s co-founder, came forward at 95 to disclose that Chavez raped her in the 1960s.
We condemn Chavez’s crimes and stand in solidarity with Dolores Huerta, Ana Murguia, Debra Rojas, and all of Cesar Chavez’s victims.
In response, the UFW canceled all Cesar Chavez Day activities. (1)See the UFW’s statement. The Cesar Chavez Foundation expressed solidarity with the survivors and condemned his actions. (2)See the Cesar Chavez foundation’s statement. The modern Brown Berets issued a statement condemning Chavez’s historical anti-immigrant positions and rape culture in the movement.
As of this writing, Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) has not commented. Nor has Legalization 4 All (L4A), FRSO’s national network of immigrant rights and Chicano liberation front groups, which includes Centro CSO in Los Angeles.
FRSO, like the groups that have made statements, traces its history in part to the Chicano movement and Chavez’s legacy. (3)FRSO merged with the Socialist Organizing Network in 1993. SON emerged from the dissolution of the League of Revolutionary Struggle, which was itself formed by the merger of I Wor Kuen and the August 29th Movement (M-L) — a Chicano Marxist-Leninist organization named after the 1970 Chicano Moratorium against the Vietnam War. See FRSO’s Unity Statement. Carlos Montes personifies this history: he is a co-founder of the original Brown Berets, was a member of the August 29th movement, and sits on FRSO’s Central Committee. (4)See his bio from FRSO’s 9th Congress in 2022. He has written fondly of meeting Chavez.
FRSO’s Chicano front group in Los Angeles, Centro CSO, presents itself as the continuation of the original Community Service Organization, which trained Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta before they founded the UFW. (5)They invoke Chavez’s legacy in the history section of their website. On Cesar Chavez Day in 2021, they further reinforced that connection.
So why have FRSO and its front groups remained silent?
1. The leading FRSO cadre in the Chicano movement are participants in FRSO’s cover ups.
Carlos Montes and Marisol “Sol” Marquez lead Centro CSO. Montes sits on the Central Committee that presided over the cover ups. Our document names Marquez explicitly for her role in defending Dustin Ponder against sexual assault allegations in 2014. Together with Xavi Velasquez, a Dallas FRSO cadre who enforced the cover-ups locally, they lead Legalization 4 All and FRSO’s internal Chicano commission nationally. These are people who have already chosen a side.
2. FRSO is pathologically incapable of seriously assessing its mistakes.
We documented the pattern: no self-criticism from the Center for protecting Dan Sullivan, no self-criticism for overturning Dallas’s decision without consultation, no self-criticism for Tom Burke’s threats. No analysis of why half of the Dallas district resigned. When confronted about the Dustin Ponder case, Mick Kelly insisted their handling was correct.
An organization that cannot acknowledge its own mistakes will not voluntarily confront the legacy of those it upholds.
3. FRSO’s legitimacy depends on claiming this legacy uncritically.
FRSO brands itself through claimed continuity with historical movements: Centro CSO invokes the Community Service Organization that trained Chavez and Huerta; New Students for a Democratic Society revives the name of the 1960s student movement; the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression carries the name of a 1970s formation. In each case, the actual organizational connections are tenuous.
This inherited legitimacy means a new organizer encounters what appears to be a historically rooted movement and takes that history at face value. Seriously reckoning with Chavez would crack one pillar of a structure that needs all of them standing.
4. FRSO runs on the same logic that kept Chavez’s victims quiet for decades.
Chavez led the UFW through purges, suppression of internal dissent, and organizational control tactics adopted from the Synanon cult (6)See “Shattered Dreams,” Dissent Magazine; “Telling the truth about César Chávez,” Left Business Observer; “Cesar Chavez: Horrifying Abuse, but One of Many Errors of Judgement,” New Politics; and “We Already Knew Chavez Was Bad,” Flyover Takes. - tactics that mirror FRSO’s own anti-democratic practices.
As detailed in the New York Times investigation, relatives and union members were aware of allegations of abuse for years. When Debra Rojas, one of Chavez’s child victims, posted publicly that Chavez had molested her, UFW members accused her of jeopardizing everything the movement had built. Accountability becomes a threat to the organization’s survival. The organization frames those who push for it as enemies of the movement - “wreckers,” in FRSO’s terminology - a framing that only makes sense if the organization considers itself synonymous with the cause.
Huerta herself remained silent for decades because she internalized this logic: “I believed that exposing the truth would hurt the farmworker movement I have spent my entire life fighting for.“ (7)Huerta’s medium post.
FRSO’s silence on Chavez is consistent with how it responds to its own scandals: don’t address it and wait for attention to move on. Cesar Chavez Day is March 31. Centro CSO has historically organized annual events commemorating the day. Whether Centro CSO or any Legalization 4 All affiliate addresses Chavez’s abuse before then is an open question.
If you have information about FRSO or FRSO-affiliated organizations, or if you want to reach out for any other reason: [email protected].