Puneet Maharaj

Executive Director
California Nurses Association
National Nurses Organizing Committee

Puneet Maharaj is the executive director of California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC), the largest affiliate of National Nurses United (NNU). NNU is the biggest union and professional association in the United States, with more than 225,000 RN members nationwide.

Puneet has served the union for more than 13 years in nearly every capacity. She began as a labor rep in the Kaiser Permanente division in 2012 and then moved to the Sutter Health division. Puneet’s dedication and leadership resulted in her promotion to lead representative and then to assistant director of the public sector division, culminating in her promotion to public sector director in 2020.  

When organizational needs arose in 2022, Puneet stepped up to run the union’s California government relations department. Two years later, Puneet seamlessly assumed the position of national political and government relations director, overseeing all of the union’s federal political work in D.C., as well as in California. In that role, Puneet has met the moment of Trump 2.0, coordinating the union’s political fightback with her keen experience in collective bargaining and the organization’s trade union philosophy. Soon after in July 2025, she was named executive director.

Puneet is a testament to the power of determination and opportunity. She was born in the state of Punjab in India before her single mother, a farmer, decided to immigrate to the United States in 1992. Once in the U.S., her mother worked her way up to becoming a research and development engineer. Puneet’s dedication to advocating for all workers is deeply ingrained through witnessing injustices her mother and family experienced as immigrant workers. Her role as a wife and mom to her three amazing children has helped prepare her for this important leadership role, giving her insight into the varied and multiple challenges and responsibilities often borne by registered nurses, a predominantly female profession.  

She graduated from California State University - Sacramento with a bachelor’s degree in political science and government, and has a master’s degree in public administration with an emphasis on health care from University of San Francisco.

CNA/NNOC is the nation’s largest, state-based union of direct-care RNs, with more than 100,000 members in all 50 states.