Host Will Dean speaks with Baltazar Aguirre, Jr., a local organizer with the United Farm Workers Foundation on this episode of Healthy Desert Healthy You, about the essential yet often unseen farmworker community in the Coachella Valley. Aguirre explains the Foundation’s mission to advance human dignity, labor rights, and immigrant protections while sharing the region’s billion-dollar agricultural impact. The conversation explores common misconceptions about farmworkers, the realities of extreme heat and hard labor, and the fear created by increased ICE activity. Aguirre describes Know Your Rights education, red cards, and rapid response networks that support families facing enforcement actions. Listeners learn how community members can help, why advocacy matters, and how policy wins, disaster relief, and pandemic aid have strengthened farmworker health, safety, and resilience across California today and tomorrow for rural families.

Takeaways:

1. Farmworkers are essential to the nation’s food supply and local economy
2. Agriculture contributes roughly $1 billion annually to the Coachella Valley
3. UFW Foundation empowers communities through education and advocacy
4. Common myths about immigrants and farmworkers persist and cause harm
5. ICE activity has increased fear and disrupted daily life and work
6. Know Your Rights trainings and red cards provide critical protections
7. Rapid response networks help verify and respond to enforcement actions
8. Community involvement and elected leadership matter more than ever

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