Nurses and Doctors Demand Binding Protections Before Sutter Health Acquires Allina

Nurses and doctors at Allina Health, represented by the Minnesota Nurses Association, Doctors Council SEIU, and SEIU Healthcare Minnesota & Iowa, called for legally binding guarantees to protect workers and patients before Sutter Health completes its proposed acquisition of Allina Health.

A half-dozen SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West members traveled from California to meet with more than 200 unionized health care workers who packed a community forum at Gustavus Adolphus Lutheran Church on July 13, warning them what could be in store.

Minnesota Deputy Attorney General John Keller, Assistant Attorney General of Minnesota’s Antitrust Division Elizabeth Odette, and state health economist Stefan Gildemeister moderated a forum where Allina CEO Lisa Shannon and Sutter CEO Warner L. Thomas made their pitch to health care workers.

MNA board secretary Becky Nelson brought a signed letter of understanding to the microphone, modeled on the agreement North Memorial secured when it was acquired by Sanford Health in May. She said nurses want the same protection in writing.

“Nurses are demanding that Sutter Health make legally binding commitments to honor union contracts, pensions, and other key workforce protections through a letter of understanding,” Nelson said. “I have the LOU right here in my hand tonight. You can sign it tonight.”

Shannon and Thomas did not sign the agreement. Shannon told the room collective bargaining agreements “will be honored” and said Allina’s “nonprofit mission and commitment to the community is not changing.”

Workers From California Sound the Alarm

Sarah Pineda, a Sutter health worker from California, described understaffing she said is already routine inside Sutter facilities.

“I’ve got CNAs that work for years that have 25 patients,” Pineda said. “Sometimes there’s only two CNAs that take one and put one in a room to sit. So I’ve got one CNA for my whole floor.”

Pineda said Sutter managers push workers to send colleagues home on paid time off when patient volume dips, a practice she called “flexing,” rather than maintaining staffing.

“If we’re really putting patients first, we’d staff accordingly instead of canceling and flexing people on the front end because we want to meet this bonus quota at the very end of the year,” Pineda said.

She warned that Allina’s existing union contracts could lapse once the merger closes, leaving Sutter free to walk away from them.

“If this merger happens, their contract expires,” Pineda said. “He doesn’t have to renegotiate a contract if he takes over. If he decides to move the union out, which he can do, then these people are going to suffer.”

Victoria Halvorsen works at Sutter Lakeside Hospital in Lakeport, one of eight Northern California facilities where SEIU-UHW members voted 96 percent last fall to authorize a strike over what the union called bad-faith bargaining.

“I came in to work one day to find a new memo that said that we were going to join with Allina Hospitals,” Halvorsen said.

She questioned how Sutter could commit roughly $2 billion to the Allina deal while workers were told there was no money for raises or equipment.

“We’re having meetings all the time about all these cuts and there’s no money to give raises, or to buy new equipment, or to pay for overtime or extra staffing,” she said, “and yet we can drop $2 billion into another company when we have to ship our mental health patients to other facilities, and we don’t have that.”

Halvorsen said Sutter workers were given no advance notice of the deal.

“We were told nothing either,” Halvorsen said. “So where is the transparency in explaining where we sat on that shelf as well?”

She said Sutter had declined to engage with employees’ concerns.

“You have not been willing to come and talk and discuss any of those concerns, which shows that there’s something sketchy,” Halvorsen said.

Allina’s Own Record Under Scrutiny

The California workers’ testimony landed alongside a running account of Allina’s record in Minnesota. Dr. Matthew Hoffman, a family physician and Doctors Council union leader, said Allina had closed four rural birth centers, five primary care clinics, and an entire pediatric unit at Mercy Hospital over six years, while Shannon’s pay rose from $1.8 million in 2020 to more than $4 million in 2024.

“Lisa Shannon doesn’t have to worry about how she is going to get her family medical care,” Hoffman said. “Should we trust Lisa Shannon and Warner Thomas to make a deal for what health care will look like in Minnesota without our community being involved?”

Cambridge pediatrician Dr. Lisa Schweiger said her hospital lost inpatient pediatrics, labor and delivery, and inpatient psychiatry even as it remained profitable. “We need a community benefits agreement signed prior to this merger moving forward,” Schweiger said.

Jessica Rogge, a local nurse and organizer with MNA, said Sutter’s scale, a $25 billion company against Allina’s roughly $5 billion valuation, would tilt bargaining power sharply away from workers.

“They have a lot more money to lock us out,” Rogge said, “and I hear from the Sutter nurses that Sutter does like to lock their nurses out.”

Sutter Responds, No Agreement Reached

Thomas told the forum Sutter had added more than 2,000 physicians in Northern California over three years and cut wait times. “We believe health care is local,” he said.

No community benefits agreement was signed at the forum, and no timeline has been set for the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office to complete its review of the deal.