Miguel Contreras

Who was Miguel Contreras?

Miguel Contreras was an American labor union leader. He "was known as a king-maker for both local and state politicians." Contreras was born in Dinuba, a city in California's agricultural Central Valley, to farmworker parents who had immigrated from Mexico during the 1920s under the Bracero Program.

After meeting Cesar Chávez at a rally for Robert Kennedy in the late 1960s, he became an activist for the United Farm Workers. He promoted the Delano Grape Boycott in Toronto, and organized lettuce workers in Salinas. He later led San Francisco hotel workers on a month-long strike. He was recruited by the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union, who made him a national organizer in Los Angeles. A contest over the leadership of the union's Local 11 led another labor leader, Maria Elena Durazo, to protest his involvement in the dispute. Durazo and Contreras later resolved their differences, and were married in 1988. The couple had one son, Michael.

In 1994 Contreras became political director of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, a Central Labor Council of the American Federation of Labor.