Striking Nurses Honor Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by Rallying with Rev. Al Sharpton
**MEDIA ADVISORY FOR MONDAY, JAN. 19 AT 3:30 PM**
Contact: Eliza Bates | press@nysna.org | 646-285-8491
Andrea Penman-Lomeli | press@nysna.org | 347-559-3169
STRIKING NURSES HONOR LEGACY OF DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING JR BY RALLYING WITH REV. AL SHARPTON
Nearly 15,000 NYSNA members enter 2nd week of largest nurse strike in New York City with hospital executives still stalling at the bargaining table
New York, NY— On Monday, Jan. 19, Martin Luther King Day, as nearly 15,000 NYSNA members head into the second week of the largest nurse strike in New York City history, nurses will honor the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. rallying with the Reverend Al Sharpton at 3:30 PM at Mount Sinai Morningside.
Striking nurses will continue to picket on Monday, with a focus on family and service. At Mount Sinai Hospital, nurses will provide free community health screenings from 11 AM to 1 PM. NYCHA residents at the George Washington Carver Houses across from Mount Sinai Hospital have generously opened their doors to support striking nurses, and nurses are giving back on MLK day by offering free community health screenings. Nurses on other picket lines will be hosting a family day, inviting family and community members to join them on the picket line.
In 1966, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr famously said that "Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhumane.” That’s why nurses are fighting for safe quality healthcare for all New Yorkers regardless of income, race, gender identity, or immigration status.
RALLY FOR RACIAL AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE WITH REV. AL SHARPTON
WHO: Civil rights leader Reverend Al Sharpton, Maurice Mitchell from the Working Families Party, Murad Awawdeh from the New York Immigration Coalition, NYSNA President Nancy Hagans, RN, BSN, CCRN, and striking NYSNA nurses
WHEN: 3:30 PM
WHERE: Mount Sinai Morningside, 1111 Amsterdam Ave, New York, NY 10025
NYSNA President Nancy Hagans, RN, BSN, CCRN, said, “Nurses honor the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and his commitment to racial and economic justice by fighting for every patient to be treated like a VIP regardless of the color of their skin or their ability to pay. We are on strike for patient and nurse safety. Our patients can’t get the safe quality care they need when there aren’t enough nurses at the bedside, when we don’t have protections from violence in our hospitals, or when nurses can’t access their own healthcare to stay well on the job. On MLK day and every day, we call on hospital executives to join us in our efforts to end health disparities and settle fair contracts that keep patients and nurses safe.”
On Thursday and Friday, NYSNA nurses from NewYork-Presbyterian, Mount Sinai, and Mount Sinai Morningside and West met with management and mediators in the first negotiation session since the strike began on Jan. 12. After a week away from the bedside, nurses came to bargaining with the goal of making progress on our priority issues. Despite a history of open bargaining, security initially turned NYSNA members away. Eventually, 70 members were allowed to observe negotiations, which continued past midnight with very little progress made towards settling a fair contract. NYSNA nurses put forward a revised set of proposals that hospital executives rejected without offering a counter proposal.
On Saturday, nurses kicked off MLK weekend by braving the snow to continue picketing. Nurses also held a series of nonviolent direct actions in the spirit of Dr. King, calling on hospital executives to bargain in good faith and settle contracts that keep New York City patients and nurses safe. Since wealthy hospital CEOs won’t meet nurses at the bargaining table, striking nurses took their message from the picket lines directly to the hospital CEOs where they live. Nurses picketed outside the homes of NewYork-Presbyterian and Mount Sinai executives. Press is free to use photos and videos from NYSNA’s Facebook and Instagram pages.
On Monday and throughout the week, strike lines start at 7 AM at the following locations:
Mount Sinai Hospital, 1468 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10029
Mount Sinai Morningside, 1111 Amsterdam Ave, New York, NY 10025
Mount Sinai West, 1000 Tenth Ave, New York, NY 10019
Montefiore Bronx Locations:
- Jack D. Weiler Campus, 1825 Eastchester Road, Bronx, NY 10461
- Montefiore Bronx, Henry & Lucy Moses Campus, 111 East 210th Street, Bronx, NY 10467
- Montefiore Bronx, Montefiore Hutchinson Medical Center, 1250 Waters Place, Bronx, NY
NewYork-Presbyterian locations:
- NewYork-Presbyterian Allen, 5141 Broadway, New York, NY 10034
- NewYork-Presbyterian CUMC, 177 Fort Washington Ave, New York, NY 10032
- NewYork-Presbyterian CHONY, 3959 Broadway, New York, NY 10032
Key sticking points in bargaining remain:
- Management’s threats to discontinue or radically cut nurses’ health benefits. These cuts would impact not just striking nurses at Mount Sinai, Mount Sinai Morningside and West and NewYork-Presbyterian, but nearly 44,000 people, including nurses and their families, around the state who are enrolled in NYSNA’s health benefit plan. The same wealthy hospitals that have jacked up prices for patients and they are now saying that it costs too much to cover healthcare benefits for their frontline nurses.
- Management’s attempt to roll back safe staffing standards that nurses won when they went on strike at two major hospitals three years ago.
- Management’s refusal to agree to protections from workplace violence, despite a recent active shooter incident at Mount Sinai Hospital and the recent horrific violent incident at NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital.
While nurses have fought above all for safety, management has responded with retaliation, intimidation, and stalling.
On the eve of the strike, Mount Sinai unlawfully fired 3 Labor & Delivery nurses via voicemail on the eve of the largest nurse strike in New York City history. NYSNA filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge against Mount Sinai for these unlawful terminations. Management at Mt. Sinai falsely claimed that the nurses they unlawfully fired via voicemail on Sunday interfered with the temporary travel nurses that Mt. Sinai brought in ahead of the strike — but it's clear that this was an act of pure intimidation intended to scare nurses on the eve of the strike. Two of the three L&D nurses who were unlawfully terminated are brand new mothers only recently back from maternity leave.
Mount Sinai has been aggressively union busting — especially in the Labor and Delivery unit. Late last year, management disciplined Labor and Delivery nurses for going to a union meeting. Mt. Sinai previously unfairly disciplined 14 vocal nurse leaders leading up to the strike, some of whom spoke to the press after the active shooter incident, and others who spoke to colleagues about their union and contract negotiations.
NewYork-Presbyterian has threatened job loss for striking and coerced RNs for exercising their right to strike. Montefiore has surveilled union nurses, in attempts to intimidate them and attempted to silence RNs.Montefiore also unlawfully restricted striking nurses’ access to healthcare at the hospital and unlawfully restricted their access to the hospital’s pharmacy to pick up their prescription medications. NYSNA has filed unfair labor practice charges at all three hospitals
While NewYork-Presbyterian, Montefiore and Mount Sinai – three of New York City’s wealthiest private hospitals – are claiming they can't afford to settle a fair union contract that keeps nurses and patients safe, they likely have plenty of cash on hand to use to fight their own workers. As of September 2025, these three hospitals had on hand twice as much cash and cash equivalents as they had in 2017, even adjusting for inflation, holding onto over $1.6 billion dollars, showing that the safe staffing ratios nurses won years ago allowed them to continue to rake in profits. And they’ve already spent more than $100 million on temporary traveler nurses, who don't know New York City patients or communities.
While prices in healthcare go up, so does executive pay at the largest private sector hospitals. The city’s private hospitals have increased their executive compensation by millions and according to 990 tax filings, the CEOs of New York City’s three major academic medical centers, Montefiore, Mount Sinai and NewYork-Presbyterian increased their total compensation, including salaries, benefits, and perks, by over 54% from 2020 to 2023. The CEOs at Montefiore, Mount Sinai and NewYork-Presbyterian, the same ones who say they cannot afford to safely staff their hospitals, now make, on average, nearly 12,000 percent more than the registered nurses on the frontlines caring for patients.
In 2024, NewYork-Presbyterian CEO Steve Corwin raked in $26.3 million in total compensation — that’s over $2.1 million per month, and nearly $72,000 per day. In just one day, NYP CEO Steve Corwin made more money than many New York City families make in an entire year.
###
The New York State Nurses Association represents more than 42,000 members in New York State. We are New York’s largest union and professional association for registered nurses. NYSNA is an affiliate of National Nurses United, AFL-CIO, the country's largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses, with more than 225,000 members nationwide.