The day before a million people descended on San Francisco for Pride weekend, Dolores Huerta told a room at the Commonwealth Club that the celebration carries an urgent warning: the threats facing the LGBTQ+ community are threats to everyone.

The 96-year-old United Farm Workers co-founder headlined the Fourth Annual SF Pride Human Rights Summit on Thursday, making an explicit argument for coalitional politics — linking immigrant rights, labor rights, and LGBTQ+ liberation under a single banner. Her appearance anchored what SF Pride has deliberately built as a counterweight to the weekend's festivity: a full-day organizing convening at the Commonwealth Club of California, now in its fourth year.

"Just celebrating Pride week is a reminder that we all have to be united because what we're facing is so dangerous especially for our LGBTQ community," Huerta said at the summit, according to ABC7 News.

Her language was direct about the stakes. "I think it's a very crucial moment in our country — we know we are facing a regime of fascism and we all need to be together," she said.

Huerta's presence at a Pride summit is itself a signal. At 96, she remains one of the most recognizable living symbols of California's labor movement, best known for co-founding the UFW alongside Cesar Chavez in the 1960s and coining the phrase "Sí, se puede." ABC7 reported that her Summit appearance came months after she publicly revealed allegations of sexual assault against Chavez — a disclosure that reframed her own movement legacy and placed her in a different kind of public conversation.

At Thursday's event, the frame was solidarity. Suzanne Ford, executive director of SF Pride, described the summit as intentionally designed to push past symbolic allyship. "We're at the intersection of all of this when you're fighting for justice, whether it's immigrant rights, whether it's racism, or LGBTQ rights," Ford told ABC7. "Often we intersect. And I think it's important to make sure that we're explaining why you should care about queer rights and why you should care about immigrant rights."

Ford said the goal is to translate Pride's energy into ongoing resistance. "We're actively finding ways to resist," she said.

The event fits SF Pride's 2026 theme — "Resistance in Action" — which the organization has framed as a return to protest roots in response to communities targeted by the Trump administration. The summit is held separately from the parade and festival, at the Commonwealth Club's downtown San Francisco venue, and drew activists, organizers, and community members for panels, workshops, and networking sessions. A full recording was posted by the Commonwealth Club to YouTube.

For attendees, the summit offered something distinct from the weekend's larger gatherings. "I think that grounding it before we kick off all the parties in what is at stake for us — who are we as a community, reminding us of the history of revolution and liberation — this is really about advocating for our human rights," said Veronica Keiffer-Lewis, who attended.

Julie Keiffer-Lewis, a presenter at the summit, described Huerta as a touchstone for people navigating multiple marginalized identities. "She's a symbol for so many of us. In particular, folks in marginalized communities that have multiple intersecting identities — the cost is a lot and there's so much that we don't share. But it's still there," she told ABC7.

The summit has grown steadily since its founding. SF Pride describes it as a "convening with activists, leaders, and dreamers to build power, advocate for LGBTQ+ rights, and assert our collective liberation" — language that deliberately extends the organization's mission beyond June.

The 56th Annual SF Pride Parade followed on Sunday.