NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani and US Sen. Bernie Sanders rally with nurses on
ninth day of strike
[January 21, 2026]
By PHILIP MARCELO
NEW YORK (AP) — New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and U.S. Sen. Bernie
Sanders rallied with nurses Tuesday in Manhattan during the ninth day of
the largest strike of its kind that the city has seen in decades.
The democratic socialists, speaking to a boisterous crowd of nurses in
front of Mount Sinai West on the Upper West Side, called on hospital
executives to return to the negotiating table to resolve the contract
impasse that prompted some 15,000 nurses to walk off the job last week.
“The people of this country are sick and tired of the greed in this
health care industry," said Sanders, the long-serving Vermont senator
and a native of Brooklyn, as he rattled off the multimillion-dollar
salaries of the CEOs of the three hospital systems affected by the
strike.
“Now is your time of need, when we can assure that this is a city you
don't just work in, but a city you can also live in," Mamdani added.
The nurses union says it has held one bargaining session with each of
the three hospital systems impacted — Mount Sinai, Montefiore and
NewYork-Presbyterian — since the strike began on Jan. 12.
But the sides say those hourslong meetings have ended with little
progress, and there are no plans so far this week to resume talks.
“They offered us nothing. It was all performative,” said Jonathan
Hunter, a registered nurse at Mount Sinai and a member of the
negotiating team.
The New York State Nurses Association met Sunday evening with officials
from Montefiore after holding negotiations Friday with Mount Sinai
administrators and Thursday with NewYork-Presbyterian officials.
Hospital administrators say they’ll follow the lead of contract
mediators on when to meet again with their union counterparts. Each
affected hospital is negotiating with the union independently.
The hospitals say the union is proposing pay raises that amount to a 25%
salary increase over three years. They maintain the request is
unreasonable, as their nurses are already among the highest paid in the
city.
“NYSNA’s demands ignore the economic realities of healthcare in New York
City and the country,” NewYork-Presbyterian said in a statement Tuesday,
citing federal cuts to Medicaid, as well as rising overall costs.
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Members of the New York State Nurses Association union listen to
Mayor Zohran Mamdani speak during.a picket outside Mount Sinai West
Hospital, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Ryan
Murphy)
 Outside Mount Sinai West on Tuesday
morning, nurses and their supporters marched in the frigid cold,
chanting “one day longer, one day stronger” as a caravan of New York
City taxi drivers honked their horns in support.
Nicole Rodriguez, a nurse at Mount Sinai West, said her biggest
concern in the contract dispute is preserving her health care
benefits.
She said she has an autoimmune disease that causes her to get sick
often and pass along illnesses to her child.
“If my son is not well, I’m not well, and I can’t be at the bedside
and be the nurse I want to be,” she said. “I hope management opens
their eyes to how much support we have out here, and they see that
they need to reach into their pockets and give the nurses their
health care.”
The union says the hospitals are seeking to reduce nurses benefits
but the hospitals say they’ve proposed maintaining their current
employer-funded benefits, which they say exceed what most private
employees receive.
The hospitals, meanwhile, say their medical operations are running
normally despite the walkout. They have brought on thousands of
temporary nurses to fill shifts and say they’ve made financial
commitments to extend their employment.
“Everyone who has come to work — including many who have gone above
and beyond to support the operational response — is helping to save
lives," Brendan Carr, CEO of Mount Sinai, said in a statement to
staff Monday.
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Associated Press reporter Jake Offenhartz in New York contributed to
this story.
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