Johnny Itliong says Cesar Chavez stole credit for Delano strike

Johnny Itliong has spent years pressing schools, unions, museums and political leaders to write his father, Larry Itliong, back into the center of American labor history. The dispute reaches beyond one family’s grievance: Cesar Chavez remains the most iconic face of the farmworker movement, while Larry Itliong, the Filipino organizer who helped ignite the 1965 Delano grape strike, has long been far less visible.

The strike began on Sept. 8, 1965, when Filipino farmworkers in Delano walked out under the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee. Historical summaries cited in the record say about 2,000 Filipino grape workers were involved in the early phase, and some accounts describe 800 Filipino farmworkers as starting the action under Larry Itliong’s leadership. Philip Vera Cruz helped push the committee vote to strike, and Larry Itliong later urged Cesar Chavez to merge unions and broaden the campaign for higher wages and better working conditions.

That broader fight eventually brought together the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee and the National Farm Workers Association, led by Chavez and Dolores Huerta. In the public memory that followed, Chavez became the best-known symbol of the struggle, even as federal, state and education sources continued to document the Filipino role in launching it. The U.S. Department of Labor has a Hall of Honor page for Filipino labor leaders of the Delano grape strike, while the National Park Service, the Zinn Education Project, the Asian American Education Project and California history materials all identify Itliong as central to the movement’s beginning.

The effort to restore that history has gained traction in California. On Oct. 25, 2024, the state celebrated Larry Itliong Day, which California observes annually on Oct. 25. NBC News also reported in 2015 that the Filipino community was trying to clarify the history of the Delano grape strike and that Larry Itliong was receiving recognition 50 years after the strike he began. A 2025 gubernatorial proclamation continued the state’s formal recognition.

Filipino American historical groups have also pushed the correction. The Filipino American National Historical Society has publicly spoken out about the film Cesar Chavez and has been part of efforts to clarify Filipino labor history. Johnny Itliong’s campaign now tests whether those acknowledgments remain symbolic or whether schools, unions, museums and elected officials are willing to revise the standard story of the farmworker movement to match the historical record.