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Sanders Slams Private Equity Scrooges Ending Paid Holidays for Walgreens Workers
"While the rich get richer, workers are struggling, and your decision to cut workers' paid vacation is making the problem worse."
Dec 23, 2025
Independent US Sen. Bernie Sanders on Tuesday urged the private equity firm that recently acquired Walgreens to reverse its decision to strip hourly workers at the second-largest US pharmacy chain of paid days off on Christmas and other major holidays.
After Sycamore Partners finalized its $10 billion purchase of Walgreens in late August, the pharmacy chain—now headed by CEO Mike Motz—eliminated paid holidays for New Year's Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Workers were notified of the move, which was first reported by Bloomberg, in October.
The move is typical of what private equity firms—sometimes called vulture capitalists—often do in order to maximize profits. In addition to slashing paid time off and benefits, they often reduce or freeze pay, fire workers, close locations, introduce aggressive sales targets, and reduce job security by replacing full-time positions with hourly or independently contracted workers. Walgreens announced last year that it planned on closing around 1,200 of its roughly 8,000 US stores, citing their struggling performance.
"This Thanksgiving, Walgreens' hourly workers faced the impossible choice between losing pay and spending the holiday with their loved ones," Sanders (Vt.)—who is the ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee—wrote Tuesday in a letter to Sycamore Partners founder and managing director Stefan Kaluzny.
"Walgreens employs 220,000 employees, the vast majority of whom are hourly workers... Sycamore Partners' decision to cut paid holidays for these hourly workers is unfortunately not surprising," the senator continued. "The firm follows the private equity playbook of buying businesses and aggressively extracting profit while using and abusing workers."
"For example, just one year after Sycamore Partners purchased Staples, the firm extracted $1 billion from the company as it closed 100 stores and laid off 7,000 workers," Sanders noted. "That same year, Sycamore Partners drove Nine West into bankruptcy and was accused of siphoning off over $1 billion in funds."
"Meanwhile, from 2016-22, companies owned by Sycamore Partners racked up over $3 million in labor violations, including wage-and-hour and workplace safety and health violations," he added.
During the holiday season, we all want to spend time with our loved ones. And yet, just two months after buying Walgreens for $10 billion, the private equity firm Sycamore Partners stripped hourly workers of paid vacation, including Christmas and New Year’s Day. Shameful.
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— Senator Bernie Sanders (@sanders.senate.gov) December 23, 2025 at 9:41 AM
Sanders contrasted a reality in which "60% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck" with the fact that "more private equity managers make over $100 million annually than investment bankers, top financial executives, and professional athletes combined."
"While the rich get richer, workers are struggling, and your decision to cut workers' paid vacation leave is making the problem worse," he stressed. "Some Walgreens workers make as little as $15 an hour. Cutting their paid leave will make it even more difficult for these workers to pay for housing, childcare, healthcare, and groceries."
"In short," Sanders concluded, "Sycamore Partners is forcing workers to sacrifice their basic needs for private equity profit."
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Why Walgreens’ New CEO Should Alarm Us
The man who oversaw massive store closures and job cuts at Staples is now in charge of one of America’s most important companies.
Dec 11, 2025
Sycamore Partners finalized its $18.8 billion acquisition of Walgreens this summer, relying on a staggering amount of debt to close the deal. However, a more innocuous decision may be the real warning sign that could spell doom for Walgreens and its workers: Sycamore installed Mike Motz, the CEO of Staples US Retail—another company it owns—as Walgreens’ new chief executive.
That appointment should alarm every patient, pharmacist, and community that depends on Walgreens. Motz took over at Staples US Retail in April 2019, the same month that Sycamore Partners added debt to Staples’ balance sheet to extract a $1 billion dividend for itself. Under Sycamore’s ownership, Staples has shuttered a third of its US stores, cutting tens of thousands of jobs. Just this September, Staples subsidiary Essendant announced hundreds of layoffs in Ohio, North Carolina, Florida, Texas, New Jersey. If 33% of Walgreens stores were to close, the fallout could be catastrophic: more than 70,000 layoffs and communities losing access to pharmacies and essential medications.
Sycamore Partners has developed a reputation for squeezing cash out of its acquisitions at the expense of long-term stability. The firm's history already contains documented, high-profile bankruptcies and mass layoffs. Belk and Nine West both went bankrupt while under Sycamore’s control. At Nine West, bankruptcy meant the closure of 70 stores and widespread layoffs. Belk, which Sycamore Partners acquired in a leveraged buyout in 2015, filed for bankruptcy in 2021 with $1.9 billion in funded debt. Aeropostale, meanwhile, claimed that onerous terms from Sycamore’s apparel sourcing arm helped drive it into bankruptcy.
Staples, one of Sycamore’s best-known acquisitions, has endured years of store closures since being taken private in 2017. With Sycamore in control, Staples closed roughly 33% of its stores. The decision to put the Staples CEO in charge of Walgreens signals that the same corporate strategy of mass closures may now be applied to one of America’s most important healthcare access points. The problem is not only who is running Walgreens, but also the strategy that the new executive represents.
The Walgreens acquisition is one of the largest private equity healthcare buyouts in history. That makes its outcome a bellwether for how Wall Street’s debt-fueled model could continue to reshape the healthcare sector.
Sycamore’s portfolio companies have also been cited repeatedly for workplace safety failures. Staples alone has had 37 Occupational Safety and Health Administration violations totaling more than $192,000 in fines since Sycamore acquired it—23 of them classified as serious, meaning hazards that could cause severe injury or death. Across Sycamore’s retail holdings, the absence of significant union representation has left workers without a collective voice to push back against these conditions.
Beyond leadership, the financial engineering behind this deal sets Walgreens up for trouble. Sycamore Partners relied on more than 70% debt ($13.33 billion out of $18.8 billion) to fund its acquisition of Walgreens, which is an unusually high level, compared to recent private equity buyouts. That level of leverage puts Walgreens on unstable footing from day one.
The risks of the usage of high levels of debt in private equity takeovers is well-documented. In the first quarter of this year alone, 70% of large US corporate bankruptcies involved private equity-owned companies. These bankruptcies followed a familiar script: Firms borrowed heavily to finance buyouts, extracted value from their portfolio companies, and left them unable to withstand market pressures or economic downturns. Walgreens now carries those same risks.
Sycamore Partners’ acquisitions have amassed it a portfolio of mostly retail companies, but now the Walgreens buyout brings the firm directly in contact with a public health system that hundreds of millions of Americans rely on daily. Many communities, particularly rural towns, low-income areas, and minority neighborhoods, have limited access to pharmacies.
Store closures in those communities wouldn’t just mean inconvenience; they could mean patients losing access to lifesaving medications, routine vaccinations, and basic health consultations. The potential job losses are equally severe. If tens of thousands more workers are laid off, that kind of shock would ripple across local economies, cutting off benefits and wages for tens of thousands of families.
The Walgreens acquisition is one of the largest private equity healthcare buyouts in history. That makes its outcome a bellwether for how Wall Street’s debt-fueled model could continue to reshape the healthcare sector. Unfortunately, the early warning signs are clear. A heavily indebted company, led by an executive imported from another Sycamore-owned retailer, looks less like a turnaround story and more like the setup for another collapse.
Sycamore Partners insists it can manage Walgreens successfully. But the history of the firm’s operation of its portfolio companies tells a different story. From bankruptcies at Belk and Nine West to sweeping layoffs at Staples, the firm’s track record speaks for itself. Local communities, workers, and patients may once again pay the price for Wall Street’s short-term gains.
Walgreens is more than just a household brand. For millions of Americans, it is a vital link to the healthcare system. By wresting control of Walgreens, and importing the same leadership that oversaw Staples’ store closures and job cuts, Sycamore Partners has put that link at risk. Unless something changes, the consequences could be measured not just in balance sheets, but in lost jobs, shuttered stores, and diminished access to care.
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CVS and Walgreens to Offer Abortion Pill Mifepristone in Some States
"I encourage all pharmacies that want to pursue this option to seek certification," said President Joe Biden.
Mar 01, 2024
CVS and Walgreens will soon start offering the abortion pill mifepristone in certain states, including New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, California, and Illinois.
It's not yet clear how many pharmacies in those states will sell the drug. Walgreens is considering expanding this offering to Kansas, Montana, and Wyoming.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced a rule change in January of last year that made it so retail pharmacies like CVS and Walgreens would be permitted to sell the abortion pill. Retail pharmacies that would like to be able to sell mifepristone have to certify that they know how to treat abortion patients and require that patients fill out a consent form before obtaining the drug.
🥳 Huge W for abortion access 🎉
CVS and Walgreens can now offer #mifepristone - one of the pills used in medication abortion - in states where abortion is legal!
This is ✨great news✨, but let's be clear - everyone deserves access to abortion care, no matter where they live. https://t.co/aieNA4PAO5
— Planned Parenthood (@PPFA) March 1, 2024
"With major retail pharmacy chains newly certified to dispense medication abortion, many women will soon have the option to pick up their prescription at a local, certified pharmacy—just as they would for any other medication. I encourage all pharmacies that want to pursue this option to seek certification," President Joe Biden said in a statement.
Mifepristone is the subject of an upcoming Supreme Court case that could see access to the drug limited. U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a former anti-abortion activist, issued a nationwide ban on the sale of mifepristone in April of last year in response to a lawsuit in his district that was brought by right-wing activists.
Kacsmaryk argued the FDA was wrong to approve the drug in 2000—which is very safe and has been used for decades. The Supreme Court put a hold on the ban in late April and then agreed to take the case in December.
It remains to be seen what the Supreme Court will do, but it could very well affect retail pharmacies' ability to sell mifepristone. Considering this is the court that overturned Roe, pro-choice voters are very worried about what the outcome might be. A ruling is expected in late June.
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