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Senate votes to hold Steward Health Care CEO Ralph de la Torre in contempt
Senators unanimously passed a resolution to hold Ralph de la Torre, the CEO of troubled hospital operator Steward Health Care, in criminal contempt of Congress on Wednesday.
De la Torre failed to appear at a hearing where he was subpoenaed to testify on Capitol Hill earlier this month, and the Senate resolution refers the matter to the Department of Justice for prosecution. It marks the first time first time since 1971 that the Senate has held someone in criminal contempt.
“Dr. de la Torre is not above the law,” Sen. Bernie Sanders, an Independent from Vermont, said on the Senate floor ahead of the vote. “If you defy a congressional subpoena you will be held accountable no matter who you are or how connected you may be.”
“Over the past decade, Steward, led by its founder and CEO Dr. Ralph de la Torre and his corporate enablers looted hospitals across the country for their own profit. And while they got rich, workers, patients and communities suffered,” said Sen. Ed Markey, a Democrat from Massachusetts.
Before declaring bankruptcy earlier this year, Steward owned more than 30 hospitals across eight states. CBS News previously found the company failed to pay for life-saving supplies at its facilities after de la Torre and private equity investors he partnered with extracted hundreds of millions of dollars out of the company.
Last month, the Dallas-based company closed two Massachusetts hospitals, leaving about 1,200 workers jobless, according to the state.
While Steward’s hospitals struggled, CBS News found evidence of lavish spending by de la Torre, including the purchase of a $40 million yacht in 2021, a $7 million Texas horse ranch in 2022, and two corporate jets that senators have valued at $95 million.
The contempt resolution comes after senators spent months trying to get de la Torre to publicly answer questions about his management of the company. De la Torre had been subpoenaed to testify on Sept. 12 in front of a Senate committee investigating the bankruptcy, but did not show up.
An attorney for de la Torre previously asked the senators to postpone his client’s testimony until after Steward’s bankruptcy proceedings are resolved. Last week, as the committee was weighing contempt resolutions, de la Torre sought to invoke his Fifth Amendment right to not testify.
In a letter, de la Torre’s attorney wrote that lawmakers “sought to frame Dr. de la Torre as a criminal scapegoat for the systemic failures in Massachusetts’ health care system.”
In addition to being presented with the criminal contempt referral against de la Torre, the Department of Justice has opened a separate criminal probe into Steward. A federal grand jury in Boston is examining the compensation, spending and travel of the company’s top executives, including de la Torre, a person familiar with the matter told CBS News.
Through a spokesperson, de la Torre has denied wrongdoing.
“Dr. de la Torre did everything in his power to help Steward Health Care overcome numerous industry headwinds and challenges, including personally purchasing necessary equipment and supplies in order to address the needs of patients and personally guaranteeing loans for the company with his assets,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters says workers at seven Amazon facilities will begin a strike Thursday morning in an effort by the union to pressure the e-commerce giant for a labor agreement during a key shopping period.
The Teamsters say the workers, who authorized walkouts in the past few days, are joining the picket line after Amazon ignored a Dec. 15 deadline the union set for contract negotiations. Amazon says it doesn’t expect any impact on its operations during what the union calls the largest strike against the company in U.S. history.
The Teamsters say they represent nearly 10,000 workers at 10 Amazon facilities, a small portion of the 1.5 million people Amazon employs in its warehouses and corporate offices.
Amazon is ranked No. 2 on the Fortune 500 list of the nation’s largest companies.
At a warehouse in the New York City borough of Staten Island, thousands of workers who voted for the Amazon Labor Union in 2022 and have since affiliated with the Teamsters. At the other facilities, employees – including many delivery drivers – have unionized with them by demonstrating majority support but without holding government-administered elections.
The strikes happening Thursday are taking place at an Amazon warehouse in San Francisco and six delivery stations in southern California, New York City, Atlanta and the Chicago suburb of Skokie, Illinois, according to the union’s announcement. Amazon workers at the other facilities are “prepared to join” them, the union said.
“Amazon is pushing its workers closer to the picket line by failing to show them the respect they have earned,” Teamsters General President Sean M. O’Brien said in a statement.
“If your package is delayed during the holidays, you can blame Amazon’s insatiable greed. We gave Amazon a clear deadline to come to the table and do right by our members. They ignored it,” he said.
The Seattle-based online retailer has been seeking to re-do the election that led to the union victory at the warehouse on Staten Island, which the Teamsters now represent. In the process, the company has filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the National Labor Relations Board.
Meanwhile, Amazon says the delivery drivers, which the Teamsters have organized for more than a year, aren’t its employees. Under its business model, the drivers work for third-party businesses, called Delivery Service Partners, who drop off millions of packages to customers everyday.
“For more than a year now, the Teamsters have continued to intentionally mislead the public – claiming that they represent ‘thousands of Amazon employees and drivers’. They don’t, and this is another attempt to push a false narrative,” Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said in a statement. “The truth is that the Teamsters have actively threatened, intimidated, and attempted to coerce Amazon employees and third-party drivers to join them, which is illegal and is the subject of multiple pending unfair labor practice charges against the union.“
The Teamsters have argued Amazon essentially controls everything the drivers do and should be classified as an employer.
Some U.S. labor regulators have sided with the union in filings made before the NLRB. In September, Amazon boosted pay for the drivers amid the growing pressure.
NEW YORK — The Teamsters union is launching a strike against Amazon at numerous locations across the country, including in Maspeth, Queens.
The Teamsters are calling it the largest strike against Amazon in United States history, and it’s set to begin at 6 a.m. Thursday. In addition to New York City, workers will be joining picket lines in Atlanta, Southern California, San Francisco and Illinois.
In a video announcement released Wednesday night, workers voiced their frustrations.
“Us being strike ready means we’re fed up, and Amazon is clearly ignoring us and we want to be heard,” one worker says in the video.
“It’s really exciting. We’re taking steps for ourselves to win better conditions, better benefits, better wages,” another worker in the video says.
The union says it represents about 10,000 Amazon employees and that Amazon ignored a deadline to come to the table and negotiate. The $2 trillion company doesn’t pay employees enough to make ends meet, the union asserts.
At the height of the holiday season, many are wondering what this means for packages currently in transit.
Teamsters President Sean O’Brien said, “If your package is delayed during the holidays, you can blame Amazon’s insatiable greed.”
Amazon says Teamsters are misleading the public
An Amazon spokesperson says the Teamsters are misleading the public and do not represent any Amazon employees, despite any claims.
“The truth is that the Teamsters have actively threatened, intimidated, and attempted to coerce Amazon employees and third-party drivers to join them, which is illegal and is the subject of multiple pending unfair labor practice charges against the union,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
An Amazon representative says the company doesn’t expect operations to be impacted.
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