Trump Made New Regulations Mandating RN Nursing Hours Cut After Taking Super PAC Donations from Owner
By | July 13, 2026

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RN Nursing Hours Cut, Beginning Feb. 2, 2026, will gut the federal requirement that nursing homes maintain a registered nurse on-site around the clock. This rule will no longer exist. The slashed rule severs a straightforward, common-sense rule created under the Biden administration-requiring 24/7 nurse presence.
This cut repeals safe 24-hour RN staffing
This cut RN Nursing Homes Hours Cut to 1/3 of a day by Trump

RN Nursing Homes Cuts reduce RN coverage from 24 hours to 8 hours. This makes residents more likely to be left in medical limbo. They are served by overworked or undertrained staff who try to decide whether something is “urgent.” It means much slower intervention for strokes, sepsis, respiratory failure, and the countless complications that define elder care. So the entire nursing home population is at terrible risk. It means even more reduced accountability from nursing home cuts in facilities where staffing has been a chronic problem for decades.
Nursing Homes Serve Patients who need 24/7 Nursing care Not RN Nursing Home Cuts
Nursing homes (also called Skilled Nursing Facilities) care for elders who need round-the-clock medical attention. Residents are categorized by their specific health needs. These categories include short-term rehabilitation patients, people managing chronic illnesses, individuals with advanced dementia, and those needing hospice care at the end of life.

RN Nursing Home Hours cut to 1/3 of day by Trump into Biden’s 24 Hr RN Coverage
Medicare withdrew Safe Medicare Rules Biden had established
The Biden-era created minimum staffing requirements for 24-hour staffing in Medicare- and Medicaid-funded nursing homes. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued an Interim Final Rule. They withdrew the standards for 24-hour nursing care available to nursing home patients before they could take full effect.
RN Nursing Home Hours Cut Increases Patient Neglect
The slashed rule was a Biden-era mandate intended to combat patient neglect. It required nursing homes to provide at least 3.5 hours of care per patient daily and mandated that a Registered Nurse (RN) be on-site 24/7. In late 2025, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), under the Trump administration, stopped defending the rule in court. Then they subsequently fully revoked it. HHS argued that the staffing requirements placed an excessive burden on the facilities.
RN Nursing Home Hours Cut Increase Patient Injuries
The slashed rule has caused safety Risks: Critics of the dangerous new cut-out rule of RN Nursing Homes Hours Cut that RNs are only required in nursing homes for 8 hours a day. This leaves 16 hours a day without a nurse (2-thirds of their day and night —pushed the needle of patient danger up to a red-hot maximum of injuries, like bedsores and medication errors: nursing slower intervention for strokes, sepsis, respiratory failure, and all the complications that define patients so depleted that they require the highest level of care and are not getting

Cut means overworked or undertrained staff & Nurses
Beginning Feb. 2, 2026, the federal requirement that nursing homes maintain a registered nurse on-site around the clock will no longer exist. RN Nursing Homes Cuts RN Nursing Homes Hours Cut will be the new norm. A straightforward, common-sense rule created under the Biden administration. A 24/7 nurse presence meant residents were less likely to be left in medical limbo while an overworked or undertrained staff member tried to decide whether something was “urgent.” It means slower intervention for strokes, sepsis, respiratory failure, and the countless complications that define elder care. It means accountability in facilities where staffing has been a chronic problem for decades.
What does this new change of RN Nursing Homes Cut? Mean?
The RN not being on-site 24/7 really mean inside a facility. Many nursing homes already operate with dangerously low staffing levels. Certified nursing assistants often manage far more residents than they safely can. Licensed practical nurses juggle medication rounds and assessments with little support. RNs are the only ones with the training to identify subtle but serious declines. When no RN is on-site, those signs are missed. Missed signs lead to missed diagnoses. Missed diagnoses lead to preventable deaths.

Trump took bribes from Nursing home executives
Later that same month, a handful of nursing home executives who had given the biggest donations joined industry lobbyists at Mr. Trump’s golf club in suburban Washington to plead their case, according to campaign finance filings and people familiar with the meeting.
Trump Trades Donations to his Super PAC for Rule Change
The Trump administration repealed a Biden-era rule that required nursing homes to have a Registered Nurse (RN) on-site 24/7. But his administration made this change after nursing home executives and corporate owners donated millions of dollars to a pro-Trump super PAC and urged him to reverse the policy:
Trump Repealed Nursing Home Law After Millions of Dollars in Donations went to him
So the Trump administration repealed federal staffing requirements for nursing homes, after millions of dollars in donations went to a pro-Trump super PAC at a private lunch meeting between the president and corporate nursing home executives.

Over light lunch fare, the contingent “urged the president to formally repeal the harmful minimum staffing mandate, which would have surely forced providers throughout the country to close their doors to new residents — or possibly close their doors altogether,” Bill Weisberg, the founder and chief executive of Saber Healthcare Group, recounted in a text message to The New York Times.

What can you do? Contact your Congressman and tell them you want the government to change back so nursing homes have 24-hour-a-day RNs. Go to a town meeting if your congressman holds one and bring up nursing homes not having full staffing of RN’s and the danger to the elderly, frail patients that Trump has targeted with 2/3 less care to help rich facility owners

ABOUT CATHY Cathy Cress holds an MSW in Aging from UC Berkeley. Her book, Handbook of Geriatric Care Management, published by Jones and Bartlett, is the Bible of geriatric care … Continue reading About us
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