According to the Minnesota Board of Nursing:
The Nurse Licensure Compact (NLC) allows a nurse (RN and LPN/VN) to have one compact license in the nurse’s primary state of residence (the home state) with authority to practice in person or via telehealth in other compact states (remote states). The nurse must follow the nurse practice act of each state. The mission of the Nurse Licensure Compact is: The Nurse Licensure Compact advances public protection and access to care through the mutual recognition of one state-based license that is enforced locally and recognized nationally.
John Phelan at Econlib writes:
Currently 34 states are members of the compact. The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated very clearly the benefits the NLC offers of being able to tap a larger workforce. Indeed, at the height of the pandemic in April 2020, Governor Walz signed an Executive Order allowing healthcare workers licensed in other states to work in Minnesota, effectively entering the state into the NLC.
Guess who’s against this idea? Minnesota nurses.
Isn’t it always this way? Once members of a professional association go to the trouble to become licensed in a given state they don’t want it to be any easier for others to work in their state. This is also true of licensed occupations whose barriers to entry are lowered to less trained members. A lot of the doctors I know do not want NPs/PAs having even a limited right to practice unless it’s under a physician.