By Friday, the walkout at six downtown hotels had stretched through a full week, with hundreds of workers from those properties taking part. The action began on October 9, when staff at six properties — the Sheraton Grand Chicago Riverwalk, Palmer House Hilton, Waldorf Astoria Chicago, Westin Chicago River North, Westin Michigan Avenue, and Millennium Knickerbocker — left their posts.
The walkout coincided with the Chicago Marathon, an event that drew tens of thousands of participants and considerable visitor numbers across the city. Four Chicago neighbourhoods — the Loop, River North, Streeterville, and the Gold Coast — account for the bulk of hotel locations, placing them within areas that draw conventions, tourists, and upscale retail activity.
Contracts covering roughly 7,000 workers at 46 properties expired at the end of August, yet through September — when members cast ballots authorising a walkout by an 85 percent margin — UNITE HERE Local 1 kept the overwhelming share of those employees on the job.
Roughly 1,500 teaching and professional staff members at City Colleges of Chicago backed a work stoppage with a 96 percent authorisation vote, pointing to October 19 as the date a walkout would begin. At six facilities in the Chicago area, roughly 500 nursing home employees had moved toward a walkout before SEIU representatives disclosed a tentative contract deal, pulling back the planned action.
Hotel bookings across Chicago totalled 11.9 million room nights throughout 2025, with the resulting revenue of $2.9 billion setting a new high-water mark for the industry, according to data from Choose Chicago, the city's official body for tourism promotion. Revenue generated by hotels in the city centre reached an all-time high of $949 million across the summer months of 2025. Tourism data released by the municipality put visitor expenditure across Chicago at $21.5 billion over the previous year.
Data gathered by UNITE HERE in 2025 showed that roughly a third of those who responded had trouble meeting housing payments, nearly three in ten faced difficulty keeping up with utility bills, and around two-thirds had seen their working hours cut back during the off-season. Off-cycle schedules and periodic workforce reductions can leave hourly employees financially vulnerable, regardless of how their posted wage rates compare.
Joel Pacheco, a dishwasher who has worked twenty-five years behind the dish station at the Sheraton, earns a wage of $26.50 per hour. In a television interview, Pacheco outlined two reasons behind the decision to strike: preserving the health coverage that extends to her children, and securing pay sufficient to meet her household's needs.
Juana Sanchez, a housekeeper at the Sheraton Grand, told a broadcaster that her floor's staffing had dropped from 118 women to 92, adding that workloads once shared between two people were now falling to one. In a statement released by the union, room attendant Cassandra Pope described being scheduled for six consecutive shifts without advance notice and said that pressure to turn over rooms at speed left both her and co-workers feeling their worth as employees went unacknowledged.
Danetta McPhan, a steward at the Hyatt Regency McCormick Place — a property not included among those targeted — told reporters in September that two and a half decades on the job had left her unable to reliably put food on the table for her four children, adding that her wages made continued employment a financial necessity.
Provisions within the 2023 Chicago hotel contract required that room-cleaning services be formally reinstated on a daily basis following a reduction in housekeeping staffing by property operators. Under that deal, hotels choosing to participate were bound to pay non-tipped staff at least $25 per hour.
Across Illinois, a federal immigration enforcement sweep conducted under the name "Operation Midway Blitz" resulted in the detention of upwards of 3,600 individuals over a roughly three-month window spanning September through November 2025. Figures compiled by community-based groups in Chicago and relayed through Borderless Magazine put the number of detentions in the city at no fewer than 80 per month dating back to June.
A Nicaraguan man employed at a suburban Minneapolis hotel was taken into custody by ICE officers lodged there in January, despite holding documentation authorising him to work legally in the country. The union told reporters that roughly 200 of its Minneapolis-area members had been staying away from public spaces due to concerns about immigration enforcement activity.
At Choose Chicago's yearly gathering inside the Hyatt Regency Chicago, Governor Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson shared a platform to mark the tourism sector's financial performance. That February appearance by Governor J.B. Pritzker marked a notable point in the timeline of events.
Hotel stays meeting the eligibility threshold carry a 1.5 percent surcharge under the Tourism Improvement District arrangement that council members approved in March — a mechanism projected to generate roughly $40 million each year, with those funds directed toward attracting visitors and securing convention bookings for the city. A $50 million tax-increment financing loan, approved by the council that September, was directed toward converting a Loop office building into a hotel.
Hyatt Hotels Corporation operates under the ownership of the Pritzker family. According to the company's own annual regulatory filing, Pritzker family business holdings controlled roughly 89 percent of all shareholder voting power at Hyatt as of January 2026. Of the three Hyatt-branded properties tied to the ongoing contract dispute — Park Hyatt Chicago, Hyatt Regency Chicago, and Hyatt Regency McCormick Place — none has received a strike call.
Around 5,000 hotel workers across Chicago walked off the job at 26 properties during 2018, among them several operated under the Hyatt brand. During that labour dispute, the union struck separate pacts — an initial agreement covering seven properties, six of them under the Marriott flag, allowed those workers to leave the picket lines while colleagues at other locations held their positions. Ballot votes on ratification were put before employees with under a day's advance notice.
Rahm Emanuel, who served as mayor at the time, described the Marriott settlement in a statement as reflecting what he called a convergence of interests between the union and hotel ownership. Fresh contracts covering Marriott, Hilton, and Hyatt properties were locked in by UNITE HERE Local 1 throughout 2023, with all three deals wrapped up ahead of the existing agreements' expiry dates.
The Chicago Federation of Labor characterized the outcome as one that would bring stability to labour relations at downtown hotels, while Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates voiced solidarity with hotel workers on October 13, telling Local 1 through a written statement that the union stood behind them.
