SACRAMENTO BEE

January 23, 2008

Clinton gets UFW backing

In Salinas, she makes appeal to Latino voters.

By Kevin Yamamura

SALINAS – As her Democratic rivals remained in South Carolina, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton made a cross-country dash Tuesday to California to receive an endorsement from the United Farm Workers and bolster her support among Latino voters here.

Clinton stood in front of a sea of red-attired UFW members who chanted "Sí, se puede" ("Yes, we can") throughout an afternoon rally at Hartnell College, emphasizing several times the need for a UFW-sponsored bill that would grant temporary worker status to farm laborers and potentially offer a path toward citizenship.

"You know, Cesar Chavez said fighting is never about grapes or about lettuce, it is always about people," Clinton said.

Clinton laid out a plan on immigration that calls for tougher border security, federal money to reimburse cities for public services immigrants use and a legalization process that asks workers to pay back taxes and learn English.

Clinton has been popular among Latino voters this election year. A Field Poll released this week showed 59 percent of California Latinos likely to vote in the Democratic primary support Clinton, compared with 19 percent for Sen. Barack Obama and 3 percent for former Sen. John Edwards.

The UFW, formed in 1962 by activists Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, has galvanized working-class Latinos into a political power in California politics and now represents more than 27,000 farmworkers.

Cesar Chavez, a 23-year-old Hartnell student named after the activist but who is not related, said he hadn't decided to vote for Clinton until learning the UFW was endorsing her. Holding a stack of "America con Hillary" bumper stickers, the Salinas resident said his father and grandparents were UFW members in the Salinas Valley. "When I looked at her plans, I felt she had more experience," Chavez said.