Anyone who has followed me on social media for a while will know that, ten years ago, I started nursing school. Having failed at teaching and needing a job that would support my three young sons, it seemed healthcare was the right path. Nursing was a dignified profession held in high public regard.
During my second full year as a nurse, COVID hit, and that's when I realized there was a rotten underbelly to nursing. Where I worked, my unit — originally cardiac — was emptied and turned into an ICU overflow wing for the influx of COVID patients we were going to get. That influx never came, and for months, my unit sat empty while we were floated from unit to unit each shift.
Then came the TikTok videos, the highly coordinated dance numbers that went viral while we were also told hospitals were overwhelmed, and healthcare workers were swamped. In some places, that was true, but it was due to gross mismanagement of the pandemic response rather than the severity of the disease. But I lost a lot of respect for my colleagues and the profession, and I refused to partake in such tomfoolery while there were actually patients who were dying alone.
During COVID, nursing as a profession enjoyed very strong reputation for its ethics, with Gallup reporting nursing received 89 percent in its "Honesty and Ethics" poll. Since then, that's dropped 14 points to 75 percent, nearing the profession's low of 73 percent.
I doubt the recent news will help those numbers, because we've seen multiple nurses reveal their true colors in the past couple of weeks. This includes Malinda Cook, who was just fired from her job at VCU Health after urging healthcare professionals and women to target ICE agents with succinylcholine, a highly regulated short-acting neuromuscular blocking agent, used in surgery or emergency situations to facilitate intubation. If given inappropriately, it can be fatal. Another nurse, Erik Martindale, said it was his "ethical right" to refuse anesthesia to Republicans during surgical procedures.
In Minneapolis, Alex Pretti was also a registered nurse. "Was" is the operative word there, because Pretti was shot and killed after interfering with Border Patrol agents who were conducting an arrest of a criminal illegal alien. Prior to that altercation, Pretty reportedly broke ribs in another confrontation with law enforcement.
Now the American Nurses Association is pretending to speak for all of us, saying we demand "immediate action" in the wake of Pretti's self-inflicted death.
Alex Pretti, a registered nurse, was killed in a horrifying shooting at the hands of federal law enforcement. We ask all nurses to visit https://t.co/brSe939K7j to send a letter to your members of Congress. Let them know that nurses demand immediate action. pic.twitter.com/eAcJRus2DE
— American Nurses Association (@ANANursingWorld) January 26, 2026
You know who else was a nurse? Laken Riley. She was raped and murdered by an illegal immigrant, but the American Nurses Association X account never once uttered her name.
This nurse, who remains licensed but not practicing, also demands immediate action. She demands that the Trump administration continue deporting illegal aliens who broke our laws. This includes both the violent criminals and those who broke our immigration laws by crossing the border in violation of our immigration laws. Because for every Alex Pretti, who made the fatal choice to interfere with federal law enforcement, there are countless men, women, and children — including nurses — who have been hurt and killed by illegal immigrants.
Laken Riley was just one of them. And it's horrifying to think the American Nurses Association doesn't care about her at all.
It's even more horrifying to think that the American Nurses Association hasn't considered the long-term implications of such blatant politicization of healthcare. It will do irreparable damage to the public trust in nursing, and deservedly so. That's what the American Nurses Association, licensing boards, and healthcare organizations need to put an end to the insanity. Revoke the licenses of those who threaten to harm our law enforcement officers, and of those who say they'll withhold medical care from Republican patients, and make sure they cannot get jobs in the healthcare sector.
Otherwise, nursing will have an approval rating on-par with Democrats. And that's not a good thing.
