Issue link: https://nnumagazine.uberflip.com/i/1537380
W ith federal unions and veterans under attack, VA nurses are stand- ing up and fighting back. From coast to coast, registered nurses who work at Veterans Health Administration (VA) facilities have been sounding the alarm to stop devastating cuts to the VA and calling out attempts to privatize the VA and fighting to protect union rights for federal employees. "We know what we're witnessing is an effort to push the VA past its breaking point," said Irma Westmoreland, RN and chair of National Nurses United's VA Division, at the Unite for Veterans, Unite for America rally in Washington, D.C. on June 6, the 81st anniversary of D-Day. Westmoreland is also secretary-treasurer of NNU. "The ultimate goal is to privatize the VA and pour billions of taxpayer dollars into giant health care corporations and the pockets of billionaires instead of the veterans who served our country." In early March, VA Secretary Doug Collins confirmed that the goal was to go back to 2019 staffing levels at the VA. But nurses say a "reduc- tion in force" (RIF), as the VA calls it, in the range of 70,000 to 80,000 workers is unconscionable, especially when hundreds of thousands more veterans have enrolled in the VA health care system since 2019. Many of these enrollees became eligible for care at the VA due to the passage of the PACT Act (Honoring our Promise to Address Compre- hensive Toxics Act of 2022), which expanded VA health care eligibility to veterans who had been exposed to harmful chemicals, such as toxic burn pits, Agent Orange, and other substances during their service. Nurses say that VA has been short-staffed for years. National Nurses Organizing Committee (NNOC), an affiliate of National Nurses United (NNU), represents more than 15,000 nurses at 23 VA facilities. Under the Biden administration, VA nurses were already stretched too thin due to various hiring freezes and an extremely slow and bureaucratic hiring process that left RN applicants waiting for many months before being extended an offer. In 2024, the VA Office of Inspector General reported that 82 percent of VA facilities reported severe shortages of nurses. 18 N A T I O N A L N U R S E W W W . N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G A P R I L | M AY | J U N E 2 0 2 5 Never Giving Up VA nurses fight to stop staffing cuts and attacks on bargaining rights. By Chuleenan Svetvilas and Rachel Berger