MNA President Chris Rubesch spoke at a contract rally in Duluth May 22. (MNA photo)
This spring, over 15,000 nurses across Minnesota are in contract negotiations with hospitals. In these negotiations – but, in particular, negotiations in Duluth – something far more serious is happening. Essentia Health executives aren’t just resisting fair staffing levels and workplace protections; they are testing how far they can go in undermining a unionized workforce.
Let’s be clear: if Essentia gets away with it here, they will do it anywhere. And so will every other employer that is watching these tactics with great interest from the sidelines.
This is about more than nurse staffing. It’s about whether working people in Minnesota still have the power to shape their jobs, their safety and their futures.
At a time when corporate CEOs are riding high on record profits and federal protections for workers are under threat, Essentia’s aggressive stance is a signal. Their executives think this is the moment to turn back the clock, to roll back union gains, to break the model of solidarity that Minnesota labor has fought for decades to build.
We can’t let them.
A win here doesn’t just mean safer hospitals and clinics. It means showing that no employer is too big, too remote or too powerful to be held accountable. It means proving that unions still have teeth – that we can still organize, still bargain and still fight for what’s right.
Safe staffing saves lives. So does a strong union movement. And right now, those two things are one and the same. When nurses fight for staffing levels, we’re fighting for patients. When we fight for union rights, we’re fighting for every worker whose boss is hoping they stay quiet.
So if you’re in the trades, on the line, in a classroom or at the counter – this fight is yours, too. Come to a picket. Talk to your neighbors. Tell Essentia – and every CEO like theirs – that Minnesota doesn’t let corporations call all the shots.
If they can win here, they can win anywhere. But only if we let them.
– Chris Rubesch is president of the Minnesota Nurses Association. Stay up to date on ways to support nurses in your community at mnnurses.org.
Union Advocate 