Latest / The Bill Handel Show / Dolores Huerta’s Horrifying Secret | What Happens to Cesar Chavez’s Legacy?
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: You're listening to Bill Handle on demand from KFI AM
- 0:04Speaker 1: six forty.
- 0:06Speaker 2: I have far I Handle here on a Thursday morning,
- 0:09Speaker 2: March nineteen, and some of the stories we are looking
- 0:13Speaker 2: at the price of oil went what one hundred and
- 0:16Speaker 2: seventeen dollars a barrel? I think that's Brent crude, And now,
- 0:19Speaker 2: if I'm not mistaken, it is down to ninety three dollars.
- 0:23Speaker 1: Am I right on that one? Amy? I mean, it
- 0:25Speaker 1: is bouncing like crazy.
- 0:28Speaker 3: It's bouncing around the on from our market watch it's
- 0:31Speaker 3: at ninety seven.
- 0:32Speaker 1: But that's different than the Brent crude number.
- 0:34Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, well I think are they saying brent crude
- 0:38Speaker 2: at ninety three? I don't know, because Brent crude is
- 0:40Speaker 2: usually more expensive.
- 0:41Speaker 1: I think. Okay, moving on, it's up at one oh five. Okay,
- 0:47Speaker 1: moving on.
- 0:49Speaker 2: This is a story that is I've been reporting. We've
- 0:54Speaker 2: been reporting on it for the last couple of days,
- 0:55Speaker 2: and it.
- 0:56Speaker 1: Is far bigger than I thought.
- 1:00Speaker 2: It has to do with Caesar Chavez and it has
- 1:01Speaker 2: to do with the allegations. And keep in mind he
- 1:04Speaker 2: died nineteen ninety three, so this is way after the fact.
- 1:07Speaker 2: But what's coming out is the story about his partner,
- 1:12Speaker 2: Dolores Huerta, who founded the United farm Workers with him.
- 1:15Speaker 1: I mean, she was a full partner.
- 1:18Speaker 2: And as you know, in the history of the labor movement,
- 1:22Speaker 2: American labor movement, the two of them just changed changed
- 1:25Speaker 2: the entire world on that one, national attention to the
- 1:29Speaker 2: brutal working conditions and the wages. I talked about that
- 1:32Speaker 2: yesterday agricultural workers were effectively treated like the worst of
- 1:37Speaker 2: the slaves during the eighteen hundreds, and Chavez was the leader,
- 1:42Speaker 2: but within the movement also a legend, a mother, independent mother,
- 1:47Speaker 2: passion for addressing social issues, women's rights, poverty, racism, And
- 1:52Speaker 2: when Chaves died in ninety three, she took over the
- 1:56Speaker 2: reigns of the United farm Workers Union. At ninety five,
- 2:01Speaker 2: she still wears this mantle of sort of one of
- 2:05Speaker 2: the leaders, well actually yeah, one of the leaders of
- 2:07Speaker 2: this movement. And here is the story that has come
- 2:11Speaker 2: out that for six decades Wheerta said she was keeping
- 2:15Speaker 2: a secret. And what kind of a secret. She said
- 2:19Speaker 2: that Chavez had raped her in the nineteen sixties, and
- 2:23Speaker 2: she kept it under wraps until the New York Times
- 2:26Speaker 2: blew open this story, and that the story was that
- 2:31Speaker 2: Chavez had sexually abused two underage girls in the nineteen seventies.
- 2:35Speaker 2: And by the way, this rape was separate to that,
- 2:38Speaker 2: and Whereta said she felt manipulated and pressure to have
- 2:41Speaker 2: sex with Chavez the first time. The second time it
- 2:44Speaker 2: was an out and out rape, and she said both
- 2:48Speaker 2: encounters led to pregnancies. She hid that at the time
- 2:51Speaker 2: and then adopted the two kids out to their families.
- 2:57Speaker 1: She this is a quote.
- 2:58Speaker 2: I carry this secret for as long as I did
- 3:00Speaker 2: because building the movement was my life's work and I
- 3:04Speaker 2: wasn't going to let Caesar or anyone else get in
- 3:07Speaker 2: the way, because that would have been a huge story
- 3:10Speaker 2: and may have taken the attention away. The New York
- 3:15Speaker 2: Times quoted to women who said that shabb Has sexually
- 3:18Speaker 2: assaulted them as girls when they were This was back in.
- 3:22Speaker 1: The nineteen seventies.
- 3:23Speaker 2: Now a little bit about Huerta, and then I'm going
- 3:25Speaker 2: to go into the end of this segment and then
- 3:28Speaker 2: the next what do they do with Chavez's reputation? What
- 3:33Speaker 2: do schools do? What do communities do? But back to Guerta.
- 3:37Speaker 2: After her parents' divorce, her grandfather helped raise her and
- 3:41Speaker 2: her two brothers while her mom, Alicia, waited tables during
- 3:45Speaker 2: the day and worked at night at a cannery. And
- 3:48Speaker 2: eventually her mom bought a small hotel and restaurant and
- 3:51Speaker 2: gave free lodging to migrant farmers and their family. So
- 3:55Speaker 2: Huerta earned a teaching degree taught English in the Central Valley,
- 4:00Speaker 2: but saw the poverty and even in the classroom, and
- 4:04Speaker 2: decided she was going to help in some way. She
- 4:07Speaker 2: met Chavez in the late fifties. By the early sixties,
- 4:11Speaker 2: they had co founded the National farm Workers Association and
- 4:14Speaker 2: the Union.
- 4:15Speaker 1: Chavez became president.
- 4:17Speaker 2: As we know, Huerta became vice president, and Chavez received
- 4:21Speaker 2: all the public attention when I had the fast that
- 4:26Speaker 2: Robert Kennedy broke.
- 4:28Speaker 1: The fast with him.
- 4:29Speaker 2: Huerta was this advocate voice for women in the agricultural movement,
- 4:36Speaker 2: the agricultural community, and for the rest of the nation
- 4:40Speaker 2: among workers. And it's a story and this. I have
- 4:43Speaker 2: this conversation with Lindsay all the time where she talks
- 4:46Speaker 2: about women just not getting the credit, not being treated
- 4:49Speaker 2: the same, and I said, that's not necessarily true. But
- 4:52Speaker 2: the more of these stories that come out, the more
- 4:54Speaker 2: I agree. And then the consumer boycott of table grapes.
- 4:58Speaker 2: Remember that uvaz No and UVa's grapes were left rotting
- 5:05Speaker 2: in supermarkets. And finally the union broke the back of
- 5:10Speaker 2: the owners of.
- 5:11Speaker 1: The uh the grape.
- 5:13Speaker 2: Farms and uh then uh it the ole push was
- 5:18Speaker 2: for better working conditions. Uh it's she was ruptured, hospitalized
- 5:24Speaker 2: with a ruptured spleen and fractured ribs after she was
- 5:27Speaker 2: beaten by the police during a demonstration. Uh. And and
- 5:32Speaker 2: she was open, she said, Uh, Caesar and I had
- 5:35Speaker 2: our differences, mainly about tactics.
- 5:39Speaker 1: Uh.
- 5:39Speaker 2: In an interview with smith smoke with it, excuse me
- 5:42Speaker 2: with the Smithsonian, she talked about the challenge of being
- 5:45Speaker 2: a woman in a union dominated by Chavez and men
- 5:50Speaker 2: and the nonprofit the United farm Workers Union, and this
- 5:53Speaker 2: really just smashed them one.
- 5:55Speaker 1: You talk about being blindsided. Uh.
- 5:58Speaker 2: They issued a statement on Wednesday applauding her decision to
- 6:02Speaker 2: share her story. That's where they're going. Well, we acknowledge
- 6:07Speaker 2: the weight of this moment, the allegations. We remain focused, determined,
- 6:13Speaker 2: and inspired to serve our community with the same relentless
- 6:16Speaker 2: determination she modeled for us. And so what ends up happening?
- 6:22Speaker 2: And I want you to note that no one is
- 6:25Speaker 2: refuting that Chavez did this. No one is saying no,
- 6:29Speaker 2: No one is saying, no organization is saying. These are
- 6:32Speaker 2: simply allegations. Nothing is proven here. These are disgruntled members
- 6:39Speaker 2: of the union. No one's saying that. Everybody is accepting
- 6:42Speaker 2: this as fact. And now they are spinning. And what
- 6:45Speaker 2: do you do to United farm Workers that he created
- 6:49Speaker 2: not being refuted? And how about the schools and the
- 6:53Speaker 2: streets and the parks and the libraries that bear his name, statues,
- 7:00Speaker 2: holidays established in his honor? Well elected officials and organizations
- 7:07Speaker 2: are now spinning.
- 7:08Speaker 1: What do they do? A lot of them are calling
- 7:10Speaker 1: for a change.
- 7:11Speaker 2: A whole group, a steady stream of leaders communities across
- 7:15Speaker 2: the state are realvating, re evaluating the way that Chavez
- 7:19Speaker 2: has been memorialized. Gavin Newsom has said no decision has
- 7:23Speaker 2: been made yet, but there is a sense of urgency.
- 7:26Speaker 2: Why because March thirty first is Caesar Chavez Day in California,
- 7:32Speaker 2: and he said, if we need to move, we're going
- 7:34Speaker 2: to do it together. Now here is the problem. Officials
- 7:39Speaker 2: want to continue honoring the farm worker labor movement, but
- 7:44Speaker 2: Caesar Chavez is so connected that it is going to
- 7:48Speaker 2: be hard to attack or disown him without already somehow
- 7:54Speaker 2: affecting the union itself.
- 7:57Speaker 1: So this is really tough for everybody. There.
- 8:02Speaker 2: The intersection of Sunset Boulevard that becomes Caesar where Sunset
- 8:07Speaker 2: Boulevard and it turns into Caesar each Avias Avenue, what
- 8:12Speaker 2: do they do?
- 8:14Speaker 1: Ane? Yeah, and then they change it.
- 8:17Speaker 2: And now you've got a whole coalition of nonprofits and
- 8:21Speaker 2: faith based groups and community leaders. They've launched a change
- 8:25Speaker 2: dot org petition and want to rename it Dolores Huerta Avenue.
- 8:33Speaker 2: La City council Member Isabelle Hurrado, whose district includes Boyle Heights,
- 8:38Speaker 2: where the avenue is now named for Caesar Jaz Javez,
- 8:43Speaker 2: called for the renaming of all public locations, all events
- 8:47Speaker 2: that bear his name. Man, what do we do with that?
- 8:55Speaker 2: City council member Miguel Audias. This is Fresno City council
- 8:59Speaker 2: member said, public streets and building names are meant to
- 9:01Speaker 2: honor individuals who uplift the community, represent our highest values.
- 9:06Speaker 1: Not so much, not with Caesar Chavez.
- 9:10Speaker 2: So you've got the Latino civil rights movement, political, educational ecosystem.
- 9:15Speaker 2: They're not grappling with this. It's I wouldn't want to
- 9:20Speaker 2: be in the movement at the same time that Caesar
- 9:23Speaker 2: Chavez is. His reputation is being destroyed, and probably rightly so,
- 9:29Speaker 2: because I'm going to take it at face value that
- 9:31Speaker 2: he did exactly what he's accused of. Because no one
- 9:34Speaker 2: is saying no. No one is inner circle is saying no.
- 9:38Speaker 2: The people that worked with him, no one is saying no.
- 9:41Speaker 3: I don't even think his family has come out and
- 9:44Speaker 3: said no. I think his family came out and said that.
- 9:48Speaker 3: It's you know, disturbing in all these things. But I
- 9:51Speaker 3: don't think anybody's pushing back at all.
- 9:54Speaker 2: Yeah, and we, I mean we're here at iHeart. I
- 9:56Speaker 2: mean we're dealing with we have to change the name
- 10:00Speaker 2: of our newsroom. It's the Caesar Chavez Newsroom here at iHeart.
- 10:04Speaker 1: Is that right? Yeah? Well, I hadn't heard. You hadn't
- 10:07Speaker 1: known that, had you? You know? You know what's crazy, Bill.
- 10:11Speaker 3: I remember as a little kid seeing the farm workers
- 10:16Speaker 3: eagle on things in my house. My dad had t
- 10:18Speaker 3: shirts with it. I remember old silk screens because he
- 10:22Speaker 3: had done that at one time, was an artist doing
- 10:25Speaker 3: silk screens. That's one of the first that, as tech
- 10:29Speaker 3: eagle styleized, is one of the first images burned into
- 10:32Speaker 3: my brain as a small kid.
- 10:34Speaker 1: Well, he and all of that.
- 10:37Speaker 2: Yeah, that is the kind of pedestal that he was on. Boy,
- 10:40Speaker 2: when you fall, you fall quickly. Okay, moving over to
- 10:44Speaker 2: American Airlines. If you're an American Airlines membership account, if
- 10:48Speaker 2: you have miles since December, they've been frozen. You it's
- 10:54Speaker 2: frozen at fifty and sixty one miles. That's it done.
- 11:00Speaker 2: That's it's most you're ever going to get if you
- 11:02Speaker 2: are in economy. And for basically a dozen years, those
- 11:06Speaker 2: lowest fare tickets have been wonderful for budget travelers willing
- 11:11Speaker 2: to trade some comforts for a cheaper price. Now man
- 11:15Speaker 2: comforts have disappeared completely, perks have disappeared. Do you know
- 11:20Speaker 2: there was a time when you would get on a
- 11:22Speaker 2: you get on a coach seat, and you would get
- 11:25Speaker 2: a meal, even for a short flight. Well today, what
- 11:28Speaker 2: are you getting? Well, you're getting peanuts. Well, excuse me,
- 11:32Speaker 2: you were getting bags of peanuts, and now the peanuts
- 11:36Speaker 2: are past their use by date right there on the
- 11:40Speaker 2: little package. I mean, it is getting very, very tough.
- 11:44Speaker 2: So what's going on? Well, and this is a real
- 11:47Speaker 2: gamble the airlines are taking because they're moving, they're moving
- 11:50Speaker 2: away from any kind of perk you can possibly imagine,
- 11:54Speaker 2: taking away qualifying for miles, and that they're move in
- 12:00Speaker 2: that category change fees, non refundable fees, which has been around.
- 12:06Speaker 1: And they started all of this.
- 12:08Speaker 2: Because they had to compete with airlines like Frontier Spirit
- 12:13Speaker 2: a legend, which we're selling no perks for a very
- 12:17Speaker 2: cheap price. So they did the same thing, and so
- 12:20Speaker 2: now they offer a basic or light economy class, which
- 12:25Speaker 2: means no perks at all. And here the big one,
- 12:31Speaker 2: by the way, is you don't get a signed seating
- 12:34Speaker 2: until the last minute, and if you are a family,
- 12:38Speaker 2: you're going to be bounced all over the cabin, usually
- 12:41Speaker 2: in a middle seat, usually as near to the toilet
- 12:44Speaker 2: as they can possibly produce for you. I had no
- 12:48Speaker 2: idea there were middle seats that near the toilet, going
- 12:51Speaker 2: halfway up the airplane for people that buy coach tickets,
- 12:57Speaker 2: it is it has gotten really bad.
- 13:01Speaker 1: That's I don't know if you fly super cheap and I.
- 13:08Speaker 2: Have a matter of fact, I'm going on my vacation
- 13:10Speaker 2: and I bought the non refundable seat and if it
- 13:13Speaker 2: turns out that I can't go, then it's going to
- 13:17Speaker 2: really tag me.
- 13:18Speaker 1: I mean I will be able to change.
- 13:20Speaker 2: I get a credit, but it cost me two hundred
- 13:23Speaker 2: and fifty dollars a seat, plus I have to pay
- 13:26Speaker 2: whatever additional fares they're out there. So United charges sixty
- 13:34Speaker 2: five dollars to gay check a bag in other words,
- 13:37Speaker 2: putting the bag up in the overhead, and are now
- 13:40Speaker 2: being charged by these budget airlines, which is every airline,
- 13:44Speaker 2: and it all had to do. And the reason perks
- 13:46Speaker 2: are there and the miles are there is to establish
- 13:49Speaker 2: a loyalty program. If you fly our airline, we're going
- 13:55Speaker 2: to give you these miles where eventually you are going
- 13:58Speaker 2: to be able to use them for.
- 14:01Speaker 1: A ticket credit towards a ticket.
- 14:03Speaker 2: And it used to be that the miles were not
- 14:07Speaker 2: that extraordinary to get a ticket. Well, over the years
- 14:09Speaker 2: they've been increasing the number of miles necessary, where today
- 14:13Speaker 2: if you want an upgrade, it'll cost you eight hundred
- 14:15Speaker 2: thousand miles. Now keep in mind that you use a
- 14:19Speaker 2: credit card, and let's say a dollar a mile is
- 14:23Speaker 2: typically what they give you, and so eight if you
- 14:28Speaker 2: buy eight hundred thousand dollars worth of goods on your
- 14:30Speaker 2: credit card. Then you're going to get eight hundred thousand miles.
- 14:34Speaker 2: That is probably good for one business class ticket. It
- 14:39Speaker 2: is very tough today flying and the airlines. They don't
- 14:42Speaker 2: make money on coach, which I don't understand. They make
- 14:45Speaker 2: money on business class. Do three or four coach seats?
- 14:53Speaker 2: Are they less profitable than one business class seat because
- 14:58Speaker 2: they take up more room?
- 14:59Speaker 1: I've never run understood that formula. I really haven't. But
- 15:02Speaker 1: you fly business, you're treated well, you fly economy.
- 15:07Speaker 2: It's getting harder and harder, and loyalty programs are basically
- 15:11Speaker 2: gone because who has loyalty anymore? If you don't get
- 15:15Speaker 2: any perks, if you're not getting anything from it, why would.
- 15:18Speaker 1: You be loyal.
- 15:20Speaker 2: Now there's a lot of deep stuff in this one.
- 15:24Speaker 2: There are a lot of moving pieces because part of
- 15:26Speaker 2: what he said is true for a few drugs. And
- 15:29Speaker 2: then an argument is, even if the drugs are more
- 15:31Speaker 2: expensive here, there are countries where if you look at
- 15:35Speaker 2: the cost of living, etc.
- 15:37Speaker 1: Then the drugs are cheaper.
- 15:38Speaker 2: I mean a whole lot of different analysis and formulas.
- 15:43Speaker 2: The bottom line, drugs are not cheaper in this country.
- 15:46Speaker 2: Some are, no question about it, But very very few,
- 15:51Speaker 2: and the comparison was made well in New York Times
- 15:54Speaker 2: and a couple of German organizations compared basically Germany to
- 15:59Speaker 2: the United States in terms of drugs. Virtually across the board,
- 16:03Speaker 2: Germany and the rests of Europe and the rest of
- 16:05Speaker 2: the world, drugs are far cheaper. And the President can
- 16:10Speaker 2: argue that drugs are cheaper, and there is some argument
- 16:15Speaker 2: about it. For the most part, No, because we don't
- 16:18Speaker 2: have a national system, because we have a pharmaceutical industry
- 16:22Speaker 2: that is way way too powerful. We have the distribution
- 16:26Speaker 2: system where you have a few major distributors of those
- 16:29Speaker 2: drugs buying drugs and then selling them, distributing them on
- 16:33Speaker 2: behalf of the pharmaceutical companies way way too powerful, and
- 16:36Speaker 2: the price goes up. And the price is way up.
- 16:41Speaker 2: Now a couple things you don't hear much about how
- 16:46Speaker 2: gas prices have dropped. That one is a little tougher
- 16:50Speaker 2: to sell you. Even I think the most ardent MAGA
- 16:54Speaker 2: supporters who believe everything the President says, are looking at
- 16:58Speaker 2: the pump and going, yep, price.
- 17:00Speaker 1: Are down, just like promised.
- 17:03Speaker 2: That is going to be a little tougher, and therein
- 17:07Speaker 2: lies a real problem there's hyperbole there that the president
- 17:11Speaker 2: engages in, and a lot of it is presidents or
- 17:14Speaker 2: anybody's allowed in hyperbole. I mean, we do hyperbole all
- 17:17Speaker 2: the time. This is the best product in the world.
- 17:20Speaker 2: We're the finest, you know, it's just what you hear.
- 17:24Speaker 2: I mean, you're allowed to do that. Which you can't say,
- 17:27Speaker 2: as a matter of course, is our prices are less
- 17:31Speaker 2: than and they're not. You're not allowed to say that.
- 17:36Speaker 2: And that is where the line is crossed. And that
- 17:38Speaker 2: is exactly what happened here. The only way that prices
- 17:43Speaker 2: can really drop is when entire countries negotiate with the manufacturers.
- 17:50Speaker 2: And now you're talking some real ammunition, you're talking real leverage.
- 17:56Speaker 2: And there are some countries that simply say, if you
- 17:58Speaker 2: don't sell us this drugs at this price, we're not
- 18:02Speaker 2: going to deal with you. There is a and it's
- 18:06Speaker 2: not apocryphal. I think this happened. France was negotiating with
- 18:10Speaker 2: one of the big drug makers, and one of these
- 18:13Speaker 2: drugmakers only had there was the only person, the only
- 18:15Speaker 2: group in the world that had this particular drug.
- 18:17Speaker 1: It was patented and no one else had it.
- 18:19Speaker 2: There was no generics, there was nothing close to it,
- 18:22Speaker 2: and the and friends said this is what we're willing
- 18:25Speaker 2: to pay. And the drug company said, well, too bad,
- 18:28Speaker 2: because you're not going to have this drug then, and
- 18:31Speaker 2: France said, fine, you're not going to sell any of
- 18:35Speaker 2: your drugs in this country. They caved and it's literally
- 18:41Speaker 2: going to take that. So when we hear that through
- 18:45Speaker 2: Trump our X, what a shocker. There's Trump our X
- 18:48Speaker 2: prices are we have the lowest prices in the world
- 18:52Speaker 2: of any drugs. You go ahead and believe that. Knock
- 18:56Speaker 2: your socks off right. Oh, by the way, the war
- 18:59Speaker 2: is it was over day one. I just want to
- 19:01Speaker 2: point that out. And the nuclear program of Iran was
- 19:09Speaker 2: totally decimated, obliterated. Wait a minute, the nuclear program last
- 19:15Speaker 2: week was intact and the attack was going to happen
- 19:18Speaker 2: within a matter of days. They were going to have
- 19:20Speaker 2: the bomb. Okay, which way is it? That's why I
- 19:23Speaker 2: get so upset. I know those I get a lot
- 19:26Speaker 2: of hassle from a lot of people because you think
- 19:28Speaker 2: I'm anti Trump, and I am for the most part.
- 19:30Speaker 2: You know, I want to be honest, but I want
- 19:32Speaker 2: you to refute anything I say. Tell me that's not true.
- 19:37Speaker 2: Tell me when I say this is what the president said.
- 19:40Speaker 2: You tell me he didn't say it.
- 19:42Speaker 3: That's very, very tough words for a guy that doesn't
- 19:46Speaker 3: have to go through all the talkbacks, because I'm going
- 19:51Speaker 3: to have to listen to all the people refuting you, sir.
- 19:53Speaker 2: That's correct? And what are they going to say? Prices
- 19:56Speaker 2: at the pump are down right? Bill's lying? Are you
- 20:01Speaker 2: going to hear that?
- 20:03Speaker 1: Probably? Okay? All right, coming up.
- 20:07Speaker 2: Oh, there is a strike happening April twenty fourth. Teachers
- 20:12Speaker 2: are walking out the door at LA Unified. I'll get
- 20:16Speaker 2: into that when we return. Kf I am six point forty.
- 20:20Speaker 1: You've been listening to the Bill Handle Show.
- 20:21Speaker 2: Catch My Show Monday through Friday, six am to nine am,
- 20:25Speaker 2: and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app