Before “Yes We Can,” There Was Dolores Huerta Before it became a campaign slogan, “Sí se puede” was

Added: 2026-05-20

[00:00:00]Before there was ceue, there was Dolores Huerta. Comment Huerta if you knew she created those words. Most people know the slogan, but far fewer know the woman behind it. Dolores Huerta started as a school teacher in California. And every day she watched children of farm workers come into class exhausted, hungry, wearing worn out clothes. Kids trying to learn while their families worked fields from sunrise to sunset for almost nothing. And eventually she realized teaching those children was not enough because the problem followed them home.

[00:00:26]So, she quit and began organizing farm workers full-time, marching alongside Cesar Chavez, helping build what became the United Farm Workers Movement. But here's the part many people never hear.

[00:00:36]While Chavez often became the public face, Dolores was the strategist, the negotiator, the organizer behind the scenes, speaking to workers, leading boycots, traveling non-stop, pushing the movement forward, while many people still believed women should stay quiet, and even violence did not stop her.

[00:00:50]During a peaceful protest in San Francisco in 1988, police beat her so severely she suffered broken ribs and internal injuries. Doctors thought she might die, but she came back still organizing, still fighting, still refusing to stay silent. And those words she created, cis, became larger than the movement itself. Years later, even President Obama admitted his slogan, "Yes, we can was inspired by her words."

[00:01:10]Think about that. A phrase created by a Mexican-American activist helping shape American political history itself.

[00:01:16]Dolores Wuerta did not just talk about change. She built it. She fought for it.

[00:01:19]She survived for it. So, here's the real question. How different would history look if women like Dolores Werta were given the credit they truly deserved?

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