New Bill Would Ban Forced Nurse Overtime Nationwide

A bipartisan bill now in front of Congress would make it illegal for Medicare-participating health care facilities to force nurses to stay past the end of a scheduled shift.

The Nurse Overtime and Patient Safety Act, filed as S.5319 in the Senate and H.R.10056 in the House, was reintroduced August 6 by Senator Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon) and Representatives Doris Matsui (D-California) and Jen Kiggans (R-Virginia). It would cap how many hours a facility can require a nurse to work, protect nurses who refuse from being fired or reported to their state board, and fine providers for each known violation.

“We know that when truck drivers or pilots are pushed past the point of exhaustion, lives are put at risk. The same is true for nurses, and they should not be forced to work to the point that patient safety is jeopardized,” Merkley said. The bill’s one-pager notes that work hour limits have existed in aviation, trucking, and marine industries since the 1930s.

Kiggans, a nurse practitioner, said the workforce shortage is what put nurses in this position in the first place. “We can’t solve America’s nursing shortage until we address the workplace challenges driving talented nurses away from this important field,” she said.

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What the Nurse Overtime and Patient Safety Act Would Actually Do

The bill amends Title XVIII of the Social Security Act, meaning the rules would apply to providers that participate in Medicare. According to the bill summary released by Merkley’s office, a provider could not require a nurse to work:

• Beyond a previously scheduled shift or duty period, regardless of how long that shift is
• More than 48 hours in any workweek
• More than 12 consecutive hours in a 24-hour period
• During the 10 hours immediately following the 12th hour worked in a shift

Time spent in required meetings, education, training, on call, or on standby would count as hours worked. Nothing in the bill stops a nurse from volunteering for extra shifts, a point the sponsors emphasized.

The section-by-section outline adds whistleblower and nondiscrimination protections. A facility could not terminate, penalize, or retaliate against a nurse who refuses mandatory overtime or reports a suspected violation, and it could not retaliate by filing a complaint against that nurse with a state disciplinary agency. Violations would carry civil penalties of up to $10,000 each, and facilities would have to write a mandatory overtime policy, give it to every new nursing hire, post a sign explaining nurses’ rights, and post nurse schedules by unit.

There are carve-outs. During a declared emergency or disaster, the limits can be exceeded only if the provider first made reasonable efforts to fill the gap another way and a patient could be harmed if the nurse leaves. The bill would not preempt stronger state protections or override collective bargaining agreements, and it calls for a federal study on safe working hour standards.

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The bill is endorsed by over 50 organizations, including the American Nurses Association, National Nurses United, AFT, SEIU, and the Oregon Nurses Association. In the Senate, it is cosponsored by Adam Schiff (D-California), John Fetterman (D-Pennsylvania), and Chris Van Hollen (D-Maryland).

The ANA announced its endorsement on August 12, six days after the bill was filed. “Mandatory overtime is not a staffing strategy. It is a symptom of systemic workforce challenges that put nurses in impossible positions and increase risk at the bedside through physical fatigue and burnout,” said Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, PhD, MBA, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, president of the American Nurses Association. “ANA supports federal action that sets clear limits, strengthens protections for nurses who speak up, and helps create the safe work environments nurses and patients deserve.”

Union leaders were blunter. “We see our hospital employers abuse mandated overtime all the time to exploit nurses who already work long and often grueling shifts to care for their patients,” said Jamie Brown, RN, president of National Nurses United, who called on every senator to cosponsor the bill.

Nothing has changed at your facility yet. Both bills were introduced on August 6, 2026 and referred to committee, and neither chamber has voted. An earlier version, H.R.7546 in the 118th Congress, died in committee after being introduced in March 2024, so bipartisan sponsorship is no guarantee of passage.

Where you live still matters most in the meantime. Matsui noted that California and 17 other states have already acted to limit mandatory overtime, for a total of 18 states with laws or regulations on the books. If you work in one of the other 32, your protection right now generally comes from your contract or your employer’s own policy, not from statute. If the federal bill passes, it would set a floor rather than a ceiling, leaving stronger state laws and union contracts intact.

The stakes are real for the 5.2 million registered nurses and nearly 1 million LPNs and LVNs the sponsors say the bill would cover. The 48-hour weekly cap and the 10-hour rest requirement after a 12-hour shift would directly affect the back-to-back scheduling patterns many nurses know well, and the retaliation language is aimed squarely at the fear of being written up, reported to the board, or labeled a patient abandonment risk for saying no. It would also create a federal complaint process, run through the Secretary of Health and Human Services, for reporting a facility that keeps mandating overtime.

🤔 Would a 48-hour weekly cap change anything at your facility? Tell us in the comments below.