Congress incentivizes nurse mentors in underserved areas with $2K tax credit

What it does

This bill creates a $2,000 annual tax credit for registered nurses and healthcare providers who spend at least 200 hours per year mentoring nursing students or newly hired nurses in medically underserved areas. The credit runs through 2032 and requires certification from the academic institution or clinical employer to claim it.

Why we flagged it

The bill's sole operative mechanism is a time-limited, geographically targeted tax credit designed to increase the supply of clinical nurse educators in health professional shortage areas. It is a straightforward public-health workforce policy, not a tax expenditure carve-out for a narrow industry.

What the text implies

• The credit's effectiveness depends on whether $2,000 annually is sufficient to offset the opportunity cost of preceptorship hours for nurses already working in shortage areas; if uptake is low, the public-health goal may not be achieved despite the tax expenditure.
• Certification requirements (from academic institutions or clinical sites) create administrative burden on schools and hospitals; compliance costs may be passed to institutions or students, potentially offsetting the credit's benefit.
• The bill does not specify whether the credit is refundable; if non-refundable, lower-income nurses (who may have minimal tax liability) will receive no benefit, limiting reach in the populations most likely to work in shortage areas.
• Sunset in 2032 creates uncertainty for long-term workforce planning; institutions may hesitate to build preceptorship programs around a temporary incentive.

Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.

Who it affects

The bill directly incentivizes nurse mentorship in underserved communities, addressing a documented shortage of clinical educators and improving training quality for future nurses. The tax credit is transparent, time-limited, and tied to measurable public-health outcomes (hours served in shortage areas), with built-in reporting and evaluation requirements.

Who stands to gain

• Registered nurses and healthcare providers (individual tax filers)
• Nursing schools and academic institutions (indirect, via increased preceptor participation)

Named in the bill

Internal Revenue Service, Health Resources and Services Administration, Public Health Service Act (section 332, section 3000, section 801), State Boards of Nursing, Schools of nursing, Clinical sites and hospitals

Where it stands

3 cosponsors: 2 Republicans, 1 Democrats.

• Jan 16, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
• Jan 16, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on Finance · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance”

Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.

Money around this bill

12 lobbying clients named this bill on 19 disclosure filings across 3 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $2,218,967 in lobbying spend. A filing names 22 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.

More lobbying clients named this bill than 93% of bills with at least one filing.

Mark Kelly, the sponsor, reported $48,750 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.

• American Association of Nurse Practitioners — $950,000 on 2 filings
• American Association of Nurse Anesthetists — $275,000 on 1 filing
• American Nurses Association — $270,000 on 1 filing
• Emergency Nurses Association — $140,900 on 3 filings
• American Association of Colleges of Nursing — $120,000 on 2 filings

Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 22, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.