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For Immediate Release
October, 05 2015, 04:45pm EDT
Contact:
Charles Idelson, 510-273-2246
RNs Call for Congress to Reject Latest Trade Pact
Nurses: Any Concessions on Higher Drug Prices, Provisions to Allow Corporations to Overturn Public Protections Unacceptable
WASHINGTON
National Nurses United today urged Congress members to reject the Trans-Pacific Partnership final agreement warning there remains inadequate guarantees to assure patients and consumers will not be harmed by pharmaceutical price gouging.
NNU, the nation's largest organization of nurses, says it also opposes any trade agreement that permits transnational corporations to use extra-legal proceedings to overturn public laws and regulations, the Investor State Dispute Settlement corporate tribunals seen in prior trade deals.
The nurses said they are in full agreement with Sen. Bernie Sanders who said today, that "Wall Street and other big corporations have won again. It is time for the rest of us to stop letting multinational corporations rig the system to pad their profits at our expense."
While full details of the final pact remain murky, "there is simply no basis for any concessions that give the pharmaceutical corporations a green light to continue pricing patients in the U.S. or other countries out of affordable medications," said NNU Co-President Jean Ross, RN.
Recent outrage over the decision of one pharmaceutical CEO, Martin Shrkeli to jack up prices by 5,000 percent on Duraprim, an anti-infection drug critical for people with weakened immune systems, "symbolizes why we need to close down on the handouts to big pharma, not give them greater monopoly control over high prices," Ross noted.
With profits for the five largest pharmaceutical corporations topping $56 billion last year alone, and increased reporting on how much of the "innovation" drug companies claim they need is actually financed with taxpayer subsidies, "no one should be assisting the price gouging that puts patients' lives at risk," Ross said.
Ross cited concerns voiced by economist Joseph Stiglitz and Adam Hirsh who warned last week about the U.S. insistence on TPP language that permits the drug companies to maintain "their monopolies on patented medicines, keep cheaper generics off the market, and block 'biosimilar' competitors from introducing new medicines."
The nurses "will also protest any agreement that allows any corporation to sue a government for 'lost' profits due to laws or regulations that establish public protections," Ross added. News reports today said that the final TPP agreement had excluded tobacco companies from ISDS, which have committed some of the most notorious abuses under the corporate tribunals. "Why just tobacco when you have had many other corporate giants exploiting the same disgraceful extra-legal proceedings, Ross said. "No corporation should ever have the right to override laws that protect public safety."
National Nurses United, with close to 185,000 members in every state, is the largest union and professional association of registered nurses in US history.
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Screwworm Parasite 'No Longer Contained in Texas' as Trump USDA Doubles Down on Efforts to Blame Biden
"This has nothing to do with Joe Biden," one senator said, "but Trump and DOGE definitely screwed our cattle industry."
Jun 09, 2026
The Trump administration has emphasized in recent days that the New World screwworm infection found in a calf in Texas did not pose a threat to the United States' larger cattle herd, which is at its lowest point in 75 years due largely to drought conditions—but the US Department of Agriculture is now acknowledging that cases of the parasite have been found outside the Texas containment zone and as far away as in New Mexico, as Republican officials attempt to blame the Biden administration for the outbreak.
While Democratic lawmakers are among those connecting the arrival of screwworm—a flesh-eating bug that feeds off the living tissue of warm-blooded animals and had been eradicated in the US in 1966—to cuts by President Donald Trump's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that specifically targeted screwworm monitoring programs, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins doubled down on claims that an "open border policy" under the Biden administration was to blame.
"This does trace back to the last administration and the open border policy, and the movement of millions of people and their animals up from South America through Central America," said Rollins with certainty on Monday.
As David Dayen explained at The American Prospect Tuesday, former President Joe Biden placed a ban on bison, horse, and cattle imports from Mexico in 2024, which Trump lifted in February 2025. At the same time, DOGE, under the leadership of Trump megadonor and tech billionaire Elon Musk, cut screwworm monitoring efforts and animal disease control and prevention efforts, slashing 1,300 employees from USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.
Rollins did reinstate the live import ban last May as screwworm cases were rising in Mexico and began funding prevention programs in Texas. But a $600 million facility for breeding sterile screwworm flies—a key component of successful eradication efforts—is not scheduled to be completed until late next year, and sterile flies that have been dispersed from a facility that opened in February at Moore Air Force Base in South Texas only amount to "about one one-hundredth of what it would take each week to eradicate the pest," Dayen wrote.
He also noted that Rollins has attempted to blame Biden—who has not been in office since January 2025—despite the fact that the total average lifespan of a screwworm fly is 21 days.
"The more likely explanation is that an administration with an antipathy to government ignored government’s purpose until it was too late," wrote Dayen.
The USDA established a 12-mile quarantine area around the affected area last week when the case was detected in South Texas, but on Monday the agency said another case had been found in Gillespie County, over 100 miles from where the initial case was reported.
A dog was also found to be infested in Lea County, New Mexico, more than 400 miles away.
The parasite is not expected to affect food safety, as it feeds on living tissue, but the outbreak raises concerns about rising beef prices, which are already high due to the low volume of cattle in the US. The high prices of fertilizer and fuel due to the war in Iran, and of equipment and repairs due to Trump's tariff policy, have also put a strain on the cattle industry.
“The cattle producer in the US has already been under extreme financial stress,” Joe Maxwell, president of Farm Action Fund and a farmer in Missouri, told The American Prospect. “This is serious, the screwworm outbreak. But it’s even more serious because of the financial position they were already under.”
In response to Rollins' claims, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said Tuesday: "Let's be clear about what happened: DOGE cut the programs and staff that tracked dangerous outbreaks like screwworm."
"So this has nothing to do with Joe Biden," she said, "but Trump and DOGE definitely screwed our cattle industry."
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As Mike Johnson Floats Social Security Cuts, Trustees Report Shows Harm of Trump Policies
“MAGA Mike Johnson won’t show the American people his secret plan to eliminate Social Security because he knows Republican policies are wildly unpopular."
Jun 09, 2026
Social Security's trustees said in their annual report released Tuesday that the New Deal program will be unable to pay out full benefits by the end of 2032—a quarter earlier than projected last year—in the absence of congressional action, a finding that advocates said underscores the destructive impact of President Donald Trump's policy agenda and the need to make the rich finally pay their fair share into the system.
“This is the first Social Security trustees report that begins to take Donald Trump’s second term policies into account: A tax bill that largely benefited the wealthy, economy-wrecking tariffs, a needless war with Iran, and hostility to immigrants," said Nancy Altman, the president of Social Security Works. "All of these have reduced the amount of money going into Social Security, weakening the system’s finances."
The trustees report was released a day after House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) declared in a radio show appearance that "entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and things like Social Security" need to be "adjusted and fixed," which critics say is euphemistic language for benefit cuts, given past GOP proposals such as raising the retirement age.
Johnson said the GOP intends to release a new Social Security plan "next year," without providing any details.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), House Democrats' campaign arm, immediately pressed Johnson, suggesting he's delaying Republican plans for Social Security and Medicare until after the 2026 midterms to avoid consequences at the ballot box.
“MAGA Mike Johnson won’t show the American people his secret plan to eliminate Social Security because he knows Republican policies are wildly unpopular and will be resoundingly rejected by the American people in November," said Justin Chermol, a DCCC spokesperson.
The new trustees report projects that Social Security's Old-Age and Survivors Insurance will be able to pay out full benefits "until the fourth quarter of 2032, one quarter earlier than projected last year."
"At that time, the fund’s reserves will become depleted and continuing program income will be sufficient to pay 78% of total scheduled benefits," the trustees said.
Max Richtman, president and CEO of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare (NCPSSM), stressed that the new projection "does not mean that Social Security is going ‘bankrupt’ or ‘broke.’"
"Nor does the trustees report mean that benefits must be cut to maintain the program’s fiscal health," said Richtman. "It would be grossly unfair to ask beneficiaries on fixed incomes to bear the cost of strengthening Social Security. While conservatives favor benefit cuts (such as raising the retirement age, means testing, or reduced COLAs), we advocate for revenue-side solutions where the wealthy pay their fair share."
Specifically, NCPSSM and other progressive advocacy groups and lawmakers have called for raising the Social Security's payroll tax cap, which currently exempts annual income above $184,500 from the program's dedicated payroll levy.
Richtman said that lifting the payroll tax cap and "subjecting some of high earners’ investment income to Social Security taxes" would keep the program solvent "well beyond the 2030s." He noted that Democratic lawmakers have introduced legislation to shore up Social Security's finances by taxing the rich, but the bills have gone nowhere in the Republican-controlled Congress.
In a joint statement issued in response to the trustees report, Reps. John Larson (D-Conn.), Richard Neal (D-Mass.), and Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) said that "instead of joining Democrats to protect and enhance" Medicare and Social Security, "Donald Trump and Republicans are busy sabotaging them."
"After DOGE took a wrecking ball to the Social Security Administration under false pretenses, all Americans got were slashed customer service and their most personal data put at risk—without a penny saved," the Democrats said. "Combined with their sole legislative achievement pricing millions out of coverage and putting Medicare on the chopping block, there is no greater threat to Americans’ wellbeing than Republican governance."
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Fears of Escalation After Trump Says US Must ‘Respond’ to Iran Downing Apache Helicopter
"We... worry deeply that US retaliatory strikes will trigger another destabilizing military exchange that has no winners," said the National Iranian American Committee.
Jun 09, 2026
President Donald Trump said the US military would "respond" after Iran reportedly took down an Army Apache helicopter on Tuesday, raising fears of yet more escalation amid collapsing ceasefire talks.
"I have just been informed by our Great Military that last night the Iranians shot down one of our highly sophisticated Apache Helicopters while patrolling over the Strait of Hormuz," the president wrote on Truth Social. "There were two pilots involved, both are safe and uninjured. Nevertheless, the United States must, of necessity, respond to this attack."
The Iranian state-owned outlet PressTV acknowledged that the aircraft had gone down, describing it as coming amid "Iran's decisive retaliation against Washington's incessant violations of a ceasefire with the Islamic Republic," though it did not clarify whether it had been shot down or had gone down for a different reason.
US Central Command said on Tuesday morning that "the cause of the incident is under investigation."
It is the first known instance in which an Apache, one of the most powerful aircraft in the US arsenal, was downed since the US and Israel attacked Iran in late February. Two US officials told CNN that it was brought down by an Iranian drone.
The US has deployed Apache and other aircraft as part of its effort to escort vessels through the Strait of Hormuz, where Iran has blocked most maritime traffic in retaliation for the US launching the war, dramatically spiking global oil and gas prices. The US has also enacted its own naval blockade of Iranian ports.
The downing of the aircraft comes amid Israel's escalating attacks on Lebanon, which Iran has described as a red line for ceasefire negotiations.
After trading fire over the weekend, Israel and Iran agreed to pause their attacks against one another after Trump begged them to "stop shooting." But Iran warned that if Israel continues its devastating attacks on Lebanon, in violation of a recent ceasefire, it would continue firing.
On Tuesday, Israel issued yet another forced evacuation order for all the residents of Tyre, Lebanon's fourth largest city before pummeling it with strikes, killing at least eight people and injuring another 32, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry.
Israel claimed last week that militants from the Iranian-backed militia Hezbollah were hiding out there, but according to Reuters, it did so "without providing evidence."
Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which was forced to suspend its operations in the city and nearby areas due to the attacks, denounced Israel's "forced displacement practices," which have left more than 1 million residents of Lebanon displaced from their homes.
The National Iranian American Council warned of further escalation on Tuesday after the downing of the American helicopter, saying it jeopardized the prospects for peace.
"Military escalation amid the ceasefire became normalized via Israel’s military operations in Lebanon and the US imposition of a blockade," the group said in a statement posted to social media on Tuesday. "Now, the tempo of stresses to the ceasefire is increasing at an alarming rate."
"We are thankful that the helicopter pilots survived last night’s military exchange that unfolded in the Strait of Hormuz, yet worry deeply that US retaliatory strikes will trigger another destabilizing military exchange that has no winners," the group continued. "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. We must choose peace or be condemned to more disastrous war."
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