BOB PURVIS/Arizona Daily Wildcat Activists gather outside Taco Bell Friday afternoon to protest the restaurant. Taco Bell buys tomatoes from a company that pays its workers $25 to pick a ton of tomatoes.

More than two dozen UA students and other Tucsonans waived banners and picket signs outside a Taco Bell near campus, Friday, in opposition to possible worker's rights violations.

The protesters lined the southwest corner of East Speedway Boulevard and North Campbell Avenue chanting slogans like "Yo no quiero Taco Bell!" and "Taco Bell, shame on you. Farm workers are people too!" as rush hour traffic sped by. Several cars pulled in to the Taco Bell parking lot to examine the banners more closely.

UA students joined a group of campus protests across the country, including some at Cornell University and University of Southern California, to boycott Taco Bell for their connection to a tomato farm in Florida with substandard workers' rights.

"A lot of people just don't know anything about it," said Inez Duarte, a Mexican-American studies and political science major, "We are out here to make people aware."

Taco Bell purchases tomatoes from Six L's Packing Co. Inc., an Immokalee, Fla.-based company. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers have said Six L's has poor working conditions, holds tomato pickers in debt and uses both violence and threats of violence to curb workers' rights. They have also said that Six L's has failed to raise workers' wages since 1978, forcing tomato pickers to pick a ton of tomatoes to earn $25.

Rosalinda Vasquez, a senior majoring in Spanish and Mexican-American studies joined in the protest holding a sign that read, "No more slaves, pay a living wage".

Vasquez said that she came to the strike to show her opposition to Taco Bell's association with farms that mistreat workers and to honor peace activists like Cesar Chavez.

"It is really appropriate for people to know how they treat workers, and it's important for people to hold hem accountable," Vasquez said.

The anniversary of Chavez's death kicked off Field Worker's Rights Week last Monday, and Friday's protests fell on the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination.

Last semester, pressure from student protesters pushed the University of San Francisco to remove their on-campus Taco Bell, or to "boot the Bell" as protesters put it.

However, local UA protesters were undeterred as some people declined free tacos from a local Mexican food restaurant, and walked into Taco Bell to buy food.

"We are here because everyone deserves to be treated like a human being. Farm workers are people too, and people need to know who they are affecting when they spend their money here," said Duarte, as a car full of passengers chanted "Taco Hell" as they drove by.

More information on the nationwide boycott can be found at www.ciw-online.org.