WASHINGTON, DC-- National Nurses United, the nation's largest union and professional association of registered nurses, announced today its endorsement of Council Member Vincent Orange in the District of Columbia for the April 1 Democratic mayoral primary.

The California Nurses Association/National Nurses United today welcomed the 2014 introduction of legislation to hold non-profit hospitals more accountable on meeting their charity care and community benefit obligations. AB 503, jointly authored by Assembly member Bob Wieckowski of Fremont and Assembly member Rob Bonta of Oakland, addresses what CNA calls a rampant abuse of what the hospitals report in how they provide charity care and community benefit programs in exchange for maintaining their tax exempt status. CNA/NNU is the sponsor of the bill. The Greenlining Institute and the California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation are initial co-sponsors.

A U.S. federal court judge late Friday blocked an attempt by Sutter Health’s Alta Bates Summit Medical Center to unilaterally impose sweeping cuts on its entire registered nurse workforce that threatened job rights and health coverage for 1,700 RNs in Oakland and Berkeley. U.S. District Court Judge Richard Seeborg issued a temporary restraining order finding that the California Nurses Association/National Nurses United, which brought the request, “has shown that its member nurses are likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief,” and that a TRO “is in the public interest.”

Washington, DC registered nurses today called on the District of Columbia Council to pass an emergency bill to immediately improve patient care with minimum standards for safe nurse staffing in DC hospitals – and end a delay on the bill that has been fiercely opposed by a hospital industry that the nurses say has been putting their focus on budget goals and profits ahead of patient safety.

SPRINGFIELD, MA -- The Massachusetts Nurses Association/National Nurses United, on behalf of registered nurses of the Baystate Visiting Nurses Association & Hospice (BVNA&H), has filed a formal charge against Baystate Health with the National Labor Relations Board for bargaining in bad faith in negotiations for a new contract. The charge is the latest in a series of complaints filed against Baystate Health for its dealings with the nurses, both at the BVNA&H and during negotiations with the nurses at Baystate Franklin Medical Center.

Kaiser Permanente registered nurses will be holding a vigil Thursday to denounce major patient care reductions proposed for the new Oakland facility which is currently under construction and expected to open this summer, the California Nurses Association announced today. Kaiser is attempting to cut 75 nursing positions in the move to the new hospital. But nurses across all units said that they are responsible for more patients per shift than ever before. The reduction in direct-care RNs comes at a time when six out of 10 insured Californians have Kaiser, a number that is expected to increase significantly under the Affordable Care Act.