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HBO’s medical drama, “The Pitt,” tackled the issue of federal immigration enforcement in its latest episode Thursday.
As officers and ER doctors are charged with the inmate’s treatment, producer R. Scott Gemmill insists that they were trying to let the audience decide what to take from the plot line. Gemmill said the story was written before recent tensions over immigration enforcement.
“Unfortunately things turned out worse than we thought,” Gemmill told The Hollywood Reporter, adding that the script was written early last year.
The episode features two federal immigration agents entering a fictional Pittsburgh hospital with a handcuffed woman. One agent remains anonymous throughout the episode, reflecting the broader debate about whether agents should be allowed to remain anonymous.
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Two government employees were shown bringing an incarcerated woman for health care in an episode of HBO Max’s “The Pitt,” which aired Thursday, March 19. (Screenshot/HBO Max)
Tensions between the agents and the hospital staff soon began. Agents provided limited details about the woman’s injuries, saying she fell while trying to escape.
“He fell badly, his shoulder. He cried a lot when we put the ties on him,” said one of the doctors.
Tensions flared when the detainee asked the doctors to allow him to call his daughter, a request the agents completely denied, noting that he would not communicate with anyone until he was processed.
“Dr. Michael Robinavitch,” played by Emmy-winner Noah Wyle, reaches a tipping point as staff and patients begin to leave the ER out of fear of the organization’s presence. He responds with emotional fury, arguing that all patients deserve medical care, written or unwritten.
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The episode of HBO Max’s “The Pitt,” which aired Thursday, March 19, ends with the feds arresting a nurse on the medical staff. (Screenshot/HBO Max)
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The episode ends on a cliffhanger as nurse Jessie, who works part-time, is arrested and released from the hospital after intervening, believing that the agent was harming the prisoner. A medical student records a violent interaction.
While the episode shows the confrontation with the agents, Gemmill says the intention was not to push a political message but to show the challenges that health workers face.
“The tricky thing is to plan to show it in a neutral way, in terms of showing what’s going on, trying not to change people in the show and just present it as it is and let the audience decide what they take from it,” he said.
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Some observers on the Internet took it as a sign of a program that supports the anti-ICE movement. One user on X wrote, “THE PITT SAID F–K ICE!” while another wrote, “I think this is how you do an episode without ‘politics.’
While Gemmill confirmed that the episode was written several months ago, another user on X noted that the episode was made a few weeks after ICU nurse Alex Pretti was killed in a standoff with federal agents in Minneapolis.
