Home care workers fighting to end the 24-hour work day and recover stolen wages rallied outside the Labor Department’s Hanson Place offices in Brooklyn Oct. 22 to denounce Governor Kathy Hochul’s alleged complicity in ongoing worker exploitation. Photos/Joe Maniscalco
By Joe Maniscalco
Ripped off home care workers who have watched their wage theft claims vanish into a bureaucratic blackhole under New York State Governor Kathy Hochul’s watch, pressed their demands for justice and restitution this week—openly charging the chief executive with a cocktail of corruption, misogyny, and racism less than two weeks until the Nov. 3 gubernatorial election.
“Back in January, [Governor Hochul’s] administration stated an investigation was complete and promised to go ahead and issue an Order to Comply (OTC) to the employers Royal Care and ABI to pay back wages they stole from 24-hour workdays,” Chinese Staff and Workers Association activist Yueheng Zhang told demonstrators gathered outside the Labor Department’s offices in Brooklyn on Oct. 22. “Ten months later, she has backtracked the OTC, suddenly telling workers to go through private arbitrations. This is absolutely outrageous. If this isn’t corruption, then what is? Shall we compile the facts and evidence of Hochul’s corruption and demand a federal investigation?
Before leaving office last year, former New York City Comptroller and current Congressional candidate Brad Lander identified both Royal Care and ABI as two of the worst sweatshop bosses in the city fleecing home care attendants working 24-hour shifts out of more than $25 million between 2020 and 2022 alone.
“There were complaints. They were investigated. They found that ABI had stolen $14.5 million and that Royal Care had stolen $10.5 million,” Lander told a earlier home care worker rally held in Brooklyn in February. “But what good is the Department of Labor finding that they stole the wages if they don't enforce the law and get that money back—and put it in the workers’ pockets?”
In 2023, the New York State Department of Labor informed home care worker Dellanira Soto that she was owed more than $330,000. Soto spent five years working round-the-clock shifts for Royal Care while only being paid for roughly half the time she worked. Home care workers like Soto can claim full pay for the 24-hour shifts they work if they do not get at least five uninterrupted hours of sleep.
Home care worker Ilene Brooks has been waiting well over a year for restitution after the Labor Department reportedly acknowledged she is owed $150,000 is back wages.
This week, home care worker Ilene Brooks told demonstrators in Brooklyn that she is owed $150,000 after also spending five years working 24-hour workdays for another employer called Ellison Home Care.
“I filed my wage theft complaint at the Department of Labor almost a year and a half ago, and I still have not gotten back my wages,” Brooks said. “The Department of Labor has acknowledged that Ellison stole $150K from me, but does not do anything to make these criminal agencies actually pay. I am angry at Governor Kathy Hochul who lets our bosses get away with robbing us. Shame on you. Let me tell you right now—we Black women will not give up—and we will not back down.”
A spokesperson for Governor Hochul declined to address Zhang’s specific charge concerning Royal Care and ABI—saying only she is “committed to ensuring our workers receive any wages they are owed.”
“Our home care workers play an invaluable role in the lives of New Yorkers, and that is why Governor Hochul has made unprecedented investments in home care wages, increasing the minimum wage for home care aides, and securing $13 billion for home care wage increases since 2023,” the spokesperson said in an email.
At roughly the same time home care workers were rallying in Brooklyn on Thursday, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani was rallying alongside Teamsters on the steps of City Hall denouncing Amazon’s exploitation of last-mile delivery drivers and urging passage of Intro. 0518—the Delivery Protection Act.
Hizzoner, however, has consistently ignored home care workers and their ongoing fight to end the 24-hour work day in New York City with passage of Intro. 303—the No More 24 bill.
In 2024, Assembly Member Ron Kim told another home care worker rally in Brooklyn that “Democrats and progressives are losing ground” to right-wing Republicans because of their combined failure to champion basic working class struggles like ending the 24-hour workday and recovering stolen wages for home care workers.
Hochul had been polling 20 points ahead of right-wing Trump supporter Bruce Blakeman in the race for governor. That commanding lead, however, has since been trimmed down to just 11 points, and as the Staten Island Advance reports, could actually be even closer than that.
“Governor Hochul, ‘New York’s first Mom Governor’, is actually fighting tooth and nail to degrade the position of all women who do care work in our society,” home care worker advocate Belinda Hu said on Thursday. “People like my mother, my aunts, and my grandmothers who built my family. Care work is the most important work, but Governor Hochul thinks it’s worthless.”