Kaiser workers call for strike

Union leaders say they are trying to hammer out an agreement that addresses worker shortages and increases pay and retirement benefits.

“We’re authorizing a strike to win staffing that protects patients, win workload standards that stop moral injury, and win the respect and dignity Kaiser has denied for far too long,” Charmaine Morales, a registered nurse and president of UNAC/UHCP, said.

The unions also accuse Kaiser of engaging in unfair labor practices by attempting “to bypass the agreed-upon national bargaining process and interfere with good-faith negotiations that had been underway since May 2025.”

Kaiser officials said that during eight months of negotiations they offered the union-represented employees a 21.5% raise, with 16% kicking in during the first 2 years of the contract. With step increases and other “local adjustments,” the total average wage increase is about 30%.

That will add an additional $2 billion to the organization’s annual payroll costs and is the strongest contract offer in the hospital chain’s history, according to Lionel Sims, senior vice president of human resources at Kaiser.

“Unfortunately, there has been no material movement in national bargaining on key economic issues for months,” Sims said in a news release Friday. “On December 14, we were compelled to pause national bargaining following an incident involving the United Nurses Associations of California/Union of Health Care Professionals (UNAC/UHCP).”

In a video posted online a month ago, Greg Holmes, Kaiser’s chief of human resources, said that incident involved a union official claiming to have information damaging to Kaiser’s reputation and that he would keep the information from going public if they could “reach an acceptable agreement.”

While they walked away from national talks, Kaiser officials say they are willing to continue negotiations with the union’s various locals.

In response, UNAC/UHCP leaders filed an unfair labor practices charge with the National Labor Relations Board saying, in part, that Kaiser is using “feigned concern” about the accusation to dig its heels in and bypass “the mediator-supported bargaining structure.”

Kaiser officials said that during the strike — the third since last October — their hospitals, emergency rooms and medical offices will remain open and most appointments will happen as scheduled.

People whose appointments need to be changed can expected to be contacted by Kaiser in the near future.