NHP news | April 2025

Nurses and health professionals face soaring rates of workplace violence, yet no enforceable federal standard exists to protect them. The Workplace Violence Prevention for Health Care and Social Service Workers Act would require the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to mandate safety plans developed with frontline staff. Long championed by U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney (D-Conn.) and supported by the AFT, the bill aims to prevent violence before it happens and ensure safer working conditions for the health professionals who care for us every day.

 

While President Donald Trump and Elon Musk take a chainsaw to crucial federal funding, and Republicans in Congress try to cut $880 billion from Medicaid to give tax cuts to the wealthy, the AFT is focused on protecting our patients and communities. In the spring issue of AFT Health Care, AFT President Randi Weingarten calls out the chaos and uncertainty Trump is creating—and shows how we are fighting back.

 

On April 5, hundreds of thousands of people flooded the streets in more than 1,300 “Hands Off!” peaceful protests in cities across all 50 states. The message was clear and thunderous: Enough is enough. Protesters demanded an end to the escalating authoritarianism and attacks on everyday Americans led by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Turnout signaled a growing, powerful movement ready to defend democracy, civil rights, public education and the working class. AFT members turned out in force, joining rallies from coast to coast.

 

Public health has become politicized and its evidence-based approaches are severely challenged by misinformation. What is the way forward? In the new AFT Health Care, epidemiologist Jonathan M. Samet outlines how public health changed in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, how it’s being impacted by the Trump administration, and how we can work together to build healthier lives for all.  

 

This month, President Donald Trump announced the highest and most wide-ranging tariffs—taxes on goods that Americans buy—since President Herbert Hoover’s Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, which made the Great Depression worse. Trump’s tariffs apply to all of our nation’s trading partners. And the chaos has come quickly: stock markets in freefall, business confidence at the lowest level since the 2008 financial crisis. What explains this seemingly self-destructive attack on our nation’s economy? This AFT Voices post by AFT President Randi Weingarten and Damon Silvers, director of policy and special counsel at the AF-CIO, provides understanding and a way forward.

 

Join AFT President Randi Weingarten and MSNBC’s Ali Velshi for the May meeting of the AFT Book Club, featuring his new book Small Acts of Courage: A Legacy of Endurance and the Fight for Democracy. In this conversation on May 18 at 6 p.m. EDT, Velshi will share how everyone can have an outsized impact on democracy and civil society. This book club event is a call to action.