National Nurses United

NATIONAL NURSE,™ (USPS publication permit number 0807-560/ISSN 2153- 0386 print/ISSN 2153-0394 online) The Voice of National Nurses United, July-August-September 2026 (Volume 122/3) is published by National Nurses United, 155 Grand Avenue, Oakland, CA 94612-2908. It provides news of or - ganizational activities and reports on developments of concern to all registered nurses across the nation. It also carries gen- eral coverage and commen tary on matters of nursing practice, community and public health, and health care policy. It is pub- lished quarterly, with combined issues in January-February-March (winter), April- May-June (spring), July-August- September (summer), and October- November-December (fall). Periodicals postage paid at Oakland, California. POSTMASTER: send address changes to National Nurse, ™ 155 Grand Avenue, Oakland, CA 94612-2908. To send a media release or announce- ment, fax (510) 663-0629. National Nurse™ is carried on the NNU website at www.nationalnursesunited.org. For permission to reprint articles, write to Editorial Office. To subscribe, send $40 ($45 foreign) to Subscription Department. Please contact us with your story ideas They can be about practice or manage- ment trends you've observed, or simply something new you've encountered in the profession. They can be about one nurse, unit, or hospital, or about the wider landscape of health care policy from an RN's perspective. They can be humorous, or a matter of life and death. If you're a writer and would like to contribute an article, please let us know. You can reach us at nationalnurse@nationalnursesunited.org EXECUTIVE EDITOR Puneet Maharaj EDITOR Lucia Hwang GRAPHIC DESIGN Jonathan Wieder COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR Sarah Cecile CONTRIBUTORS Rachel Berger, Lauren Bloomquist, Lucy Diavolo, Kari Jones, Dawn Kettinger, Michelle Morris, Chuleenan Svetvilas, Martha Wallner PHOTOGRAPHY Omar Bantayan, Jaclyn Higgs, Tad Keyes, Choppy Oshiro we have previously reported on the horrors of Trump's deportation pro- gram in this magazine, with stories of federal agents showing up at our hospitals and even murdering VA RN Alex Pretti during their inva- sion of Minnesota, but developments over these past months have escalated into direct attacks on nurse members. In this issue, we present a package of three related stories for you: one about the major problems our Dreamer nurses have encountered with employers due to government delays in renewals, one about how our nurses who have had their tempo- rary protected status revoked are being driven underground, and of course one about how union nurses mobilized to free a colleague from Maine who was kidnapped by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). This is our reality now. This is what the Trump administration thinks is right and proper: that our own nurse members who save lives and care for our com- munities each and every day are hunted down and imprisoned or deported to places they do not call home. Their stories also show, however, that when we union nurses fight together, we can harness that power to help many nurses avoid the worst outcomes. Ultimately, we know we need to vote this regime out of power, to abolish ICE, and to build our vision of a healthy society where people have the freedom to move or stay in the commu- nities they think of as their homes. A red line represents a demarcation, a point of no return, beyond which a situation is considered acceptable or safe. We have watched Trump cross scores of red lines against working people during just the not-yet first year of his administration. We have resisted. We have protested. We have marched. But we can see it is still not enough. We are expecting a flat-out fascist rejection by the administra- tion of the midterm elections if the results are not what he wants and he loses his grip on Congress. We are nurses, the most trusted profession in the United States, and the public looks to us for leadership. We need to be prepared to esca- late with nonviolent civil disobedience if the will of the people is not respected. That is a scary thought, but these are scary times. If we do not make full use of our rights now, we may no longer have that right in the coming years. This means we need to get organized in all senses of the word. We must go deep among our existing membership to educate them about what's happening and secure their pledge to step up when those red lines are crossed. We must also con- tinue to build strength in numbers by organizing nonunion nurses into our ranks. It will take all of us, working collec- tively, to beat back this fascist takeover of our government and to realize our vision of a healthy society for all. Jamie Brown, RN; Nancy Hagans, RN; Cathy Kennedy, RN; Mary Turner, RN National Nurses United Presidents Letter from the NNU presidents Stay connected FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/NationalNurses INSTAGRAM: NationalNurses TIKTOK: @NationalNurses X: @NationalNurses FLICKR: www.flickr.com/nationalnursesunited VIMEO: www.vimeo.com/NationalNursesUnited DIGITAL MAGAZINE: NationalNurseMagazine.org

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