$600,000 and a Hug: Inside the Senior Facility That Spent a Fortune Trying to Keep 40 Workers

On a quiet January morning in Boca Raton, Florida, a group of Jewish seniors gathered in the common room of Sinai Residences, the senior living community they call home. Many of them survived the Holocaust. Some still carry numbers tattooed on their arms. They were not there to discuss bingo or medication schedules. They were there to discuss something more urgent: how to hide their coworkers from federal authorities. The residents had hatched a plan. If immigration agents came for the Haitian staff members who bathed them, fed them, and held their hands at night, the seniors would offer them shelter inside their apartments. They would hide them, the way Anne Frank's family was hidden in Amsterdam eight decades earlier. Rachel Blumberg, the facility's CEO, heard the proposal and felt the weight of history press down on her shoulders. "That reminds me of Anne Frank," she told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, her voice carrying a mixture of grief and disbelief. And with that single sentence, Sinai Residences became the defining human story of one of the most consequential immigration policy shifts in modern American history (Lapin, JTA). The Facility and Its People Sinai Residences of Boca Raton is a continuing care retirement community that houses approximately 500 seniors, a significant number of whom are Holocaust survivors. It employs roughly 450 people, and the demographics of its workforce tell a story that is both local and national. Sixty-nine percent of Sinai's employees are foreign-born. Of those, approximately 40 workers -- about 9 percent of the total staff -- are Haitian nationals holding Temporary Protected Status (TPS) or CHNV parole status (Parole for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans) (Blumberg, SCOTUS Amicus Brief). These workers fill roles that are notoriously difficult to staff in South Florida's competitive labor market. They are certified nursing assistants (CNAs), licensed practical nurses, dietary staff, maintenance technicians, and housekeepers. They are not interchangeable bodies on a staffing spreadsheet. They are people with names, faces, and deeply personal stories. "Mary" -- a pseudonym used by one CNA interviewed by Marketplace -- supports four U.S. citizen children and her father in Haiti, who is battling cancer. She is one of 26 Sinai workers who faced TPS termination in the first wave of policy changes. She has spent years building a life in the only country she has called home as an adult. Now she faces a choice she never imagined: leave her children, or take them to a country controlled by armed gangs (Marketplace). "They're actually excellent employees. They have committed no crime. They have done nothing wrong. They are literally being deported because of where they were born." -- Rachel Blumberg, CEO, Sinai Residences The $600,000 Math When the Trump administration began terminating the CHNV parole program in early 2025, Blumberg faced a logistics problem with a human price tag. Ten of her workers were immediately affected. Then, in August 2025, 28 more TPS workers received termination notices. The math was brutal: lose 40 essential workers, or spend whatever it took to even begin replacing them. She chose to spend. The figure she arrived at was $600,000 annually. That number covers wage increases across affected job categories, signing bonuses to attract replacement workers from an already shallow labor pool, and training costs for new hires who cannot possibly replicate the experience of workers with years of institutional knowledge. In a single year, Sinai Residences consumed a cost that would have been unthinkable before the policy changes (CNN). "The wage adjustments and recruitment efforts needed to attract replacement workers could cost the organization roughly $600,000 annually, if not more, with much of that burden falling on the residents." -- Supreme Court Amicus Brief, Sinai Residences & LeadingAge Southeast, April 13, 2026 The per-worker math is instructive: $600,000 divided by 40 workers equals $15,000 per employee. That is not a salary figure. That is the cost of replacing someone whose training, relationships, and trust have been built over years. And even at $15,000 per worker, Blumberg is not confident she can find the people to fill the gap. "There will be a ripple effect, and everybody's going to be fighting for the same employees in the same city." -- Rachel Blumberg, Marketplace Timeline: The Unfolding Crisis The story of Sinai Residences did not happen all at once. It unfolded in distinct stages, each carrying its own kind of loss. June 6, 2025 -- Washington Post photographer Saul Martinez documents Sinai workers in their final weeks before the first wave of terminations. The images capture a community bracing for loss. June 13, 2025 -- WPTV reports that 10 CHNV parole workers at Sinai have been terminated and told to "self-deport." Blumberg discloses the $600,000 annual cost estimate. Each worker receives $2,000 severance. Residents contribute additional money from their own pockets. August 2025 -- Twenty-eight additional TPS workers receive termination notices. The crisis doubles in scope. January 30, 2026 -- The Jewish Telegraphic Agency publishes the story of residents offering to hide staff. Blumberg's Anne Frank comparison draws international attention. The Jerusalem Post, Times of Israel, and the Forward all cover the story. April 13, 2026 -- Sinai Residences and LeadingAge Southeast file a Supreme Court amicus brief in Mullin v. Doe. The brief warns of "devastating health care impact" if TPS is terminated. June 25, 2026 -- The Supreme Court rules 6-3 in Mullin v. Doe, allowing TPS termination to proceed. July 24, 2026 -- The final TPS work authorization deadline passes. Residents in Revolt: The Letter That Got One Reply Perhaps no detail better illustrates the depth of the bond between Sinai's residents and its Haitian workers than the letter-writing campaign. When the residents learned that their caregivers might be forced to leave, they did what citizens in a democracy are supposed to do. They wrote to their elected representatives. Every single member of the U.S. House and Senate received a letter from a Sinai resident pleading for intervention. Out of 535 members of Congress, exactly one responded: Representative Jared Moskowitz (D-FL). Fun Facts: The Power of a Community Residents offered to hide staff in their apartments. Blumberg: "That reminds me of Anne Frank." The comparison made national and international news. Each affected worker received $2,000 from the facility and a hug. Residents mounted a letter-writing campaign to every member of Congress -- only ONE responded. Some Sinai residents attended an ICE protest at a local Home Depot. The one-out-of-535 response rate is more than an anecdote; it is a data point about political representation. In a district represented by a Democrat who sits on the House Judiciary Committee, the residents found a sympathetic ear. Everywhere else, the letters appear to have gone unanswered. Residents did not stop at letter-writing. Some attended an ICE protest at a local Home Depot, standing alongside their Haitian coworkers in a demonstration of solidarity that crossed lines of age, race, and religion. The Anne Frank Comparison: Controversy and Context Blumberg's comparison of her residents' offer to Anne Frank's hiding place drew sharp reactions. Some praised her for drawing attention to the severity of the situation. Others criticized the comparison as hyperbolic or inappropriate. Blumberg herself has stood by the statement, explaining the reasoning in detail. "The Haitians cannot go back to Haiti. They'll be murdered. The gangs have taken over the country, and it is life-threatening for them. And our residents do recognize and realize that." -- Rachel Blumberg, JTA The residents who lived through the Holocaust, Blumberg noted, see their own history reflected in the plight of the Haitian workers. "They can relate to not being wanted, to being kicked out and coming to America for salvage and freedom and safety and shelter. And they want to be able to protect the Haitians." -- Rachel Blumberg, JTA Dorothy Wizer, a Sinai resident, put it in practical terms. "They have been part of what has made my life so secure and with quality for almost 10 years now," she told WPTV. "If this can happen to people who show up to work every day, do their job and are here to be helping hands, what comes next" (Garcia, WPTV). Statistics: The Numbers Behind the Story The story of Sinai Residences is not an isolated case. It is a microcosm of a statewide and national dynamic that is reshaping elder care in America. ~500 Residents at Sinai (many Holocaust survivors) ~450 Total employees 40 TPS workers at risk (9% of staff) 69% Foreign-born staff $600K Annual retention/replacement cost $15K Per-worker replacement cost 1/535 Congressional response rate ~350K Haitian TPS holders nationwide The mathematics scale in sobering ways. If Sinai's experience of $15,000 per worker applies to the 35,000 healthcare workers at risk across Florida, the statewide cost reaches $525 million. And that is for nursing homes alone; it does not include hospitals, home health agencies, assisted living facilities, or hospice providers, all of which depend on the same workforce (FHCA Letter to DHS). Florida currently ranks 50th in the nation for availability of home health and personal care aides, with just 16 aides per 1,000 adults aged 65 and older. The national average is 62. The state was already in crisis before TPS termination. The removal of 35,000 healthcare workers does not create a new problem; it accelerates an existing one to the point of collapse (PolitiFact Florida/WUSF). The broader demographic pressure is relentless. The U.S. population aged 65 and older is projected to reach 82 million by 2050, a 42 percent increase from the current 58 million. The demand for elder care will grow regardless of who is in the White House or what the Supreme Court decides. The question is whether the workforce will exist to meet it. The Second Time Through the Fire Blumberg is candid about the toll this has taken. She has now lived through this crisis twice -- first with the CHNV parole termination in June 2025, when she lost 10 workers, and then with the TPS termination, when she lost 28 more. The back-to-back nature of the policy changes means she has been in permanent crisis mode for more than a year. "It was heartbreaking, it was full of tears and hugs and a lot of disbelief," she told WPTV in June 2025. "Each individual doesn't have a plan. They don't know where to go. They don't know what to do." The amicus brief filed with the Supreme Court in April 2026 was prepared pro bono by Colombo & Hurd, an immigration law firm. The brief was co-signed by LeadingAge Southeast, an association representing more than 200 elder care providers. In it, the organizations warned that the impact would be "felt most acutely in memory care and long-term care settings, where staff continuity is essential" (SCOTUS Amicus Brief). The Ripple Effect: When Costs Pass to Seniors One of the most troubling aspects of the Sinai story is who ultimately bears the cost. Blumberg has been explicit that the $600,000 in additional spending "gets passed on to the seniors." The same seniors who offered to hide their caregivers are now facing higher costs for the care they receive. The irony is bitter. The residents who survived genocide and built new lives in America are now paying more for care because the workers they trust are being taken away. And some of them are so desperate to keep those workers that they offered to break the law to hide them. "Losing them will create an entire huge gaping hole in the service industry for South Florida." -- Rachel Blumberg, WPTV The ripple effect Blumberg described is not theoretical. Nearly half of U.S. nursing homes are already limiting admissions due to staffing shortages, according to industry surveys. When facilities cannot staff their beds, they stop accepting new residents. Those residents end up in hospitals, which are themselves understaffed. The hospital beds back up, emergency rooms fill, and the entire system strains. The removal of 35,000 healthcare workers in Florida alone will accelerate this cascade (Ziegler CFO Survey; Skilled Nursing News). For organizations tracking workforce displacement and facility-level staffing disruptions, tools like PROVEN help coordinate data across provider networks to identify emerging gaps before they become crises. The ability to track, in real time, which facilities are losing workers and which patient populations are affected is essential for maintaining continuity of care. Conclusion: A Bond That Policy Cannot Sever The story of Sinai Residences is not primarily a story about policy. It is a story about people who took care of each other across lines of difference and found themselves united by a shared experience of vulnerability. The Holocaust survivors who hid from Nazis in Europe spent their final years trying to hide their friends from immigration enforcement in America. The Haitian workers who fled gang violence only to face deportation again demonstrated a resilience that their residents recognized because they had lived it themselves. Blumberg used the Anne Frank comparison because she saw the historical parallels as unmistakable. Whether one agrees with the comparison or not, the underlying reality is difficult to dispute: a community of people who had already been targeted for elimination recognized the same dynamics at work and responded the only way they knew how -- by opening their doors. The $600,000 that Sinai Residences spent is a number that will appear in policy briefs and economic analyses for years to come. But the number that matters more cannot be quantified. It is the number of residents who offered to hide their caregivers, the number of workers who received $2,000 and a hug, and the single member of Congress who thought a letter from a Holocaust survivor deserved a reply. Those numbers tell the real story of what happens when policy meets humanity. And they raise a question that no Supreme Court ruling can answer: What does a country owe the people who care for its most vulnerable? Sources Blumberg, Rachel, and LeadingAge Southeast. Amicus Curiae Brief, Mullin v. Doe, Nos. 25-1083 & 25-1084, U.S. Supreme Court, 13 Apr. 2026. supremecourt.gov. "Boca Raton Immigrant Workers Fired, Told to Self-Deport." WPTV, 13 June 2025. wptv.com. "Florida's Nursing Homes Are Bracing for Life Without Haitian TPS Workers." Mother Jones, 20 July 2026. motherjones.com. "Haitian TPS: Employers Brace for Economic Impact." CNN, 28 Apr. 2026. cnn.com. Lapin, Andrew. "Jewish Seniors Are Offering to Hide Their Haitian Caregivers." Jewish Telegraphic Agency, 30 Jan. 2026. jta.org. "Reminds Me of Anne Frank." The Forward, 30 Jan. 2026. forward.com. "Jewish Seniors Offer to Hide Carers." The Times of Israel, 30 Jan. 2026. timesofisrael.com. "State Nursing Homes Push Back on TPS Decision." Skilled Nursing News, 13 July 2026. skillednursingnews.com. "Will the End of TPS for Haitians Lead to a Caregiving Crisis?" PolitiFact Florida / WUSF, 2 July 2026. politifact.com. "Without TPS, Elder Care Industry Will Lose Critical Haitian Staff." Marketplace (APM), 22 Jan. 2026. marketplace.org. "End of TPS for Haitians Could Devastate Elder Care." Marketplace (APM), 15 Jan. 2026. marketplace.org. LeadingAge Southeast. Press Release on Amicus Brief, 13 Apr. 2026. leadingagesoutheast.org.