National Nurses United (NNU), the country’s largest union and professional association of registered nurses, today warned that the Trump administration’s recent executive order challenging state laws regulating A.I. will threaten the health and safety of patients across the country. The order directs the Justice Department to set up an "AI Litigation Task Force" to sue states over state A.I. regulations.

“Patients are already becoming the unwitting guinea pigs of scientifically unproven and unregulated A.I. that they often do not even realize is being used in decisions about their care, without their consent,” said NNU President Mary Turner, RN. “While we fight for strong regulations, nurses adamantly oppose the Trump administration’s dangerous rush to push a wild west of unproven, unchecked A.I.”

Nurses say hospital employers have sought in recent years to use A.I. and other technology to send patients who should be in the hospital back home, without 24/7 nursing care, to be remotely monitored by a “command center,” in order to boost hospital profits. Nurses say the Trump administration is now allowing technology for remote patient monitoring, including technology that uses A.I., to bypass a rigorous U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulation process. Trump’s FDA has stated that, upon request from manufacturers, it may allow digital health devices to be used on patients while waiving regulations designed to protect patients from inhumane and risky experimentation.

“We cannot trust an administration that will allow technology that has zero evidence of being safe, therapeutic, effective, or even humane — to bypass FDA regulations, just so our employers can pad their bottom line,” said Turner. “Why should A.I. be treated any differently than other medical technology that should all have a rigorous testing process? Because our federal government won’t put patients over corporate profits, we must rely on states to pass strong A.I. regulations. Our patients’ lives are at risk.”

Nurses also say they are appalled that Trump’s “A.I. czar,” advising on this new executive order, is venture capitalist David Sacks, a special government employee who required no Senate confirmation, and who still has business interests in the private sector. This underscores the primary motive in the Trump administration’s rush to pave the way for unregulated A.I., including in health care settings, is maximizing profits, say nurses — not improving patient care conditions. Nurses emphasize A.I. is not better or inevitable, and they will keep fighting for a health care system that guarantees person-to-person, hands-on care for every patient. 

NNU urges states to push back and refuse to be intimidated by the Trump administration’s so-called “A.I. litigation task force” — given that President Trump does not have the power to preempt state legislation without Congress passing a law — and to continue to pass strong state-level A.I. regulations while challenging the executive order in court.

“The hospital and tech industry have failed to show that A.I. can either complement nurses’ bedside skills or improve the quality of care for our patients,” said Turner. “This technology is intended to fragment, deskill, and replace our professional practice, and that is unacceptable. In-person touch and assessment of our patients is fundamental to safe, therapeutic, and effective nursing care, and we will not stand by as the Trump administration tries to ban state regulations and ram through technologies that aim to remove us from our patients.”

National Nurses United is the largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses in the United States with more than 225,000 members nationwide. NNU affiliates include California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, DC Nurses Association, Michigan Nurses Association, Minnesota Nurses Association, and New York State Nurses Association.