Will Randi/Mike Oust Another NYSUT President?

In April 2014, former NYSUT President Richard Iannuzzi was ousted by AFT President Randi Weingarten and UFT President Michael Mulgrew in a coup that saw the entire leadership of NYSUT, other than Executive Vice President Andy Pallotta, whacked from office.

Today Ken Lovett at the Daily News reports another NYSUT leadership whacking could be in the offing:

The recent surprise retirement of the state teacher union’s top lobbyist came amid pressure from Michael Mulgrew, head of the city teachers union, sources said.

Mulgrew, whose members make up a major segment of the state union, is said to have grown disenchanted with Steve Allinger during the legislative session.

Mulgrew didn’t deny he played a role in Allinger’s departure.

“We have to get work done, move fast, and everyone has to be on the same page,” he said.

Union insiders say the Allinger situation is part of a larger schism that has left state teachers union President Karen Magee isolated from the rest of her union leadership halfway through her first term.

Sources said Mulgrew is also unhappy with Magee, though he denied it.

The two unions, Mulgrew said, “are moving together in a much more coordinated effort than we were before. All (Magee’s) positions have been good. She’s taking the right path on things.”

It was NYSUT that was telling members of the Legislature NOT vote for Cuomo's poison pill budget that increased the test score component in APPR to 50% and gave the state the power to takeover schools with a "receivership" program, while Mulgrew and the UFT were telling them it was okay if they did vote for it.

If Magee's isolated from the rest of her union leadership (i.e., Andy Pallotta, Mikey's Man at NYSUT), it can't be because Mulgrew thinks she's not standing up enough against Cuomo and his ed deform juggernaut.

Hell, nobody rolled over to Cuomo more than Mulgrew and the UFT in the last legislative session.

In any event, it sure didn't long for another UFT-engineered whacking at NYSUT, did it?

UFT Warns Over Friedrichs But Still Doesn't Get The Real Danger

UFT President Michael Mulgrew on the Friedrichs case:

The U.S. labor movement today faces perhaps the gravest threat to its existence since the creation of our modern system of labor law and collective bargaining in 1935.

In Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, now before the U.S. Supreme Court, the plaintiffs challenge the “fair share” requirement that public-sector workers in unionized jobs who choose not to join their union must still pay their fair share of the cost of union representation and services.

They argue that agency fees should be abolished because money is speech, and requiring nonmembers to pay fees to unions therefore violates their First Amendment rights. That is patently false. Agency-fee payers can choose not to have their fees spent on unions’ political activities.

Let us be clear: Friedrichs isn’t about the First Amendment; it is about undermining this country’s labor unions because we are the last great defenders of working people and the middle class. The far-right forces behind the lawsuit despise unions because it is our collective voice and collective action that prevent them from further enriching themselves at ordinary Americans’ expense. They don’t just want to abolish agency fees; they want to abolish our unions and undo the decades of progress we have made.

Let us be clear: Mulgrew's upset not because Friedrichs threatens to undermine the "last great defenders of working people and the middle class" in this country but because it threatens to undermine the gravy train that the current leadership of the AFT/UFT/NYSUT ride on.

The AFT/UFT/NYSUT leadership stopped defending the rank and file years ago, have sold us out at every turn to the education reformers, are complicit in much of the harm done to the teaching profession (including the use of VAM, which AFT President Weingarten once championed along with Chancellor Joel Klein when Weingarten was UFT President, and teacher evaluations tied to test scores, which UFT President Mulgrew happily agreed to in 2012), and exist simply to aggrandize their own egos and enrich their own purses.

With the Friedrichs decision looming, you'd think the AFT/UFT/NYSUT leadership would become more responsive to rank and file, especially since they might have to beg members to stay with the union and continue to pay dues post-Friedrichs.

But instead, they continue to do whatever the hell they want, from endorsing Hillary Clinton long before the presidential primary season started to telling New York State legislators who voted for Cuomo's poison pill budget that imposed a receivership law for "failing" schools and upped test scores to 50% of a teacher's evaluation that it was all right for doing so.

And they spend their time attacking critics to their leadership, as happened this past week when NYSUT Executive Vice President Andy Pallotta asked the NY attorney general to look into a blog post written by a teacher that dared to criticize NYSUT for selling members out.

Quite frankly, I see the words someone wrote that Mike Mulgrew signed his name to about Friedrichs and I roll my eyes because I know that they know that they don't give a shit about any of the stuff Mulgrew says he does.

Al they care about is maintaining power, maintaining control, and maintaining the gravy train.

It's a shame they're not taking the Friedrichs threat seriously and thinking about ways to become more responsive and responsible union leaders.

Alas, it seems that the leadership of the AFT/UFT/NYSUT is incapable of that.

AFT Invests Teachers Pension Fund In Cuomo's LaGuardia Airport Renovation Project

Nick Reisman at State of Politics:

The American Federation of Teachers is touting in a digital and print advertising campaign the pension fund investment in the plan overhaul of LaGuardia Airport — a pet project of Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

LaGuardia Gateway Partners, the entity formed as one of the main vehicles for the project to renovate the sagging airport, includes the California State Teachers’ Retirement System as an investory.

The overhaul, as announced by Cuomo and Vice President Joe Biden this summer, is expected to cost $3.6 billion at Terminal B at the airport. The partners consortium is expected to finance $2 billion of the project, with $1 billion coming from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

“We wanted America to know that nurses, teachers and public workers across the country are investing in America—they are creating tens of thousands of good jobs by leveraging their pension assets and rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure—in addition to treating patients, teaching our kids and protecting our communities,” said AFT President Randi Weigarten. “This is solution-driven unionism. It proves what can happen when creative and innovative thinking is applied to America’s most pressing challenges, such as our crumbling infrastructure.”

The ad campaign will be conducted through terminals A, B, C and D at the airport.

Cuomo's pet project getting jump-started with pension money from teachers after Cuomo promised to "break" public schools.

You just can't make this up.

The next time you see some jive from the AFT, NYSUT or UFT about fighting Cuomo, remember how they're helping him out with the pension fund.

Michael Mulgrew "Bitching" About Working Families Party Discussion Of Bernie Sanders Endorsement

Ken Lovett at the Daily News:

The head of the powerful city teachers union is trying to quell talk by some in the labor-backed Working Families Party about backing Bernie Sanders over Hillary Clinton in the presidential primary, insiders say.

United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew has been contacting heads of the building trade unions who help make up the Working Families Party, a source said. He’s “complaining and bitching” about the party and the discussions on whether to endorse Sanders, the self-proclaimed socialist US senator from Vermont, the source said.

Mulgrew, who declined comment through a spokeswoman, is also a vice president of the American Federation of Teachers, which already has endorsed Clinton.

While the state Working Families Party does not have a presidential primary and does not have to set its ballot until September of 2016, its leaders have not ruled out publicly backing Sanders during the primary season to send a message to Clinton that she needs to go farther to the left.

Considering the damage Governor Cuomo has done to teachers and UFT rank and file, the end of the Lovett column is quite interesting:

The WFP, which was already feuding with Gov. Cuomo, isn’t doing its doing itself any favors alienating a major party player like Mulgrew and the potential Democratic nominee in Clinton, one source said.

In the analysis of this "source," we have Working Families Party and Sanders on one side of the political equation and Mulgrew, Clinton and Cuomo on the other.

That would seem odd, given how Cuomo has declared he wants to "break" teachers and public schools, until you remember that Mulgrew was said to have threatened WFP with financial dissolution if the party endorsed challenger Zephyr Teachout over Cuomo in 2014.

Just another sign that the "fight" between Cuomo and the UFT/AFT/Mulgrew/Weingarten crew is as "real" as something from professional wrestling.

That said, I don't particularly care whether WFP endorses Sanders or not.

Quite frankly, I don't "feel the Bern" after Sanders voted to continue the Endless Testing regime in NCLB Jr.

From my vantage point, Sanders is as full of shit as every other Democratic politician when it comes to the issue that matters most to me - education.

I will be voting Green come 2016 because I cannot and will not support a candidate who supports Endless Testing as a "civil right."

Weingarten, Mulgrew, Magee Met Personally With Cuomo In April

Jimmy Vielkind at Politico NY:

ALBANY — Gov. Andrew Cuomo met with Cardinal Timothy Dolan, the Catholic archbishop of New York, several weeks before re-introducing legislation to grant financial assistance for parents whose children attend private and parochial schools.

According to newly posted schedule records, the Democratic governor huddled with the Catholic prelate as well as with James Cultrara, the Catholic Conference's top education official, and Anthony de Nicola, a fund manager and board member of the group that pushed for the tax credit, on April 13 at the cardinal's residence in midtown Manhattan. Cuomo later held events around the state to rally support for the tax credit, which lawmakers did not enact.

The schedules also show:

-- Cuomo met with a trio of teachers' union leaders, Karen Magee of NYSUT, Michael Mulgrew of the UFT and Randi Weingarten of the AFT, on April 10, and again on April 22. The unions were vociferous opponents of the tax credit plan.

No word on what was discussed at those meetings.

Was it just about the tax credit plans?

Or was the rest of Cuomo's education reform agenda devised to "break" the public school system discussed as well?

In the end, I suppose it doesn't matter because we know what the outcome was:

They weren't terribly successful at much other than holding the line on vouchers (which may have happened because voucher proponents overplayed their hands anyway.)

Cuomo got pretty much everything else on education that he wanted.

UFT Appears To Be Only Entity/Individual Fooled By Cuomo's Common Core Review Announcement

So far I haven't seen anything but cynicism and snark from people over Cuomo's announcement that he's going to convene his third education commission/panel, this time to review the Common Core standards, the tests tied to those standards and the curriculum developed by the state that goes by the misnomer EngageNY (should be called DisengagedNY.)

Here, for example was Liz Benjamin:

Haven't we done this once already? http://t.co/Qles0LSzYy

— Liz Benjamin (@CTLizB) September 3, 2015

We have indeed: 

It is not the first time Cuomo, a staunch defender of the higher Common Core standards, has criticized their implementation in New York. In February 2014, he said the state's Board of Regents and the Department of Education had "failed utterly" in the design and roll-out of the new Regents exams.

It is also not the first time he has convened a statewide commission to tackle wide-ranging problems in K-12 education. An earlier version, the New York State Education Reform Commission, issued a 92-page "action plan" in January 2014.

He also created the plainly-named Common Core Implementation Panel in 2014. It was to "undertake an immediate and comprehensive review of the rollout of the Common Core standards in New York state," and it too produced a report.

Gary Stern and Sullio put past Cuomo/commissions into perspective:

@perdidostschool @SteveMcNY Don't forget his "New Reform Education Commission." Held hearings around NYS. Quickly forgotten.

— Gary Stern (@GarySternNY) September 3, 2015

@sullio Looks about right. Last commission met once, repeated his positions, disappeared.

— Gary Stern (@GarySternNY) September 3, 2015

So why a third education panel/commission?

The political heat on Cuomo over Common Core and the Endless Testing regime was getting, well, hot:

The governor's press release, though, was noteworthy as a response to the mounting criticism and, in particular, the wave of test refusals among families with children in grades 3-8. About one of five students declined to sit for either the math or English exam in the spring.

Or, as Steve McLaughlin put it:

Cuomo hasn't seen the light on #CommonCore he's seen the polls.

— Steve McLaughlin (@SteveMcNY) September 3, 2015

When things get hot, it's "Commission time!" in Albany - Cuomo's done this with corruption (Moreland), public utilities (LIPA commission) and education - twice as Justin Murphy reported in the D&C.

So now we have a third commission, one that Cuomo hopes will allow him to put some distance between himself and his education reform agenda.

Steve McLaughlin explains:

.@NYGovCuomo now in full back-pedal/damage control mode on his prior heavy handed, bullying in pushing #CommonCore & high stakes testing.

— Steve McLaughlin (@SteveMcNY) September 3, 2015

About the only person/entity that doesn't seem to understand this is all jive is the UFT, which hailed the announcement today:

For once @UFT is pleased w/ Cuomo: Union says it's "happy to work" w/ his commission to fix "problems created by the Common Core rollout."

— Kate Taylor (@katetaylornyt) September 3, 2015

Right - because the last two education commissions/panels Cuomo put together "fixed" so much.

On the plus side, with Cuomo now officially pulling a Chris Christie on Common Core and trying to make like he never saw it, there are only a few supporters of CCSS left:

Cuomo dumps his support for Common Core leaving only @nysut @AFTunion @UFT supporting it in NY...

— lacetothetop (@lacetothetop) September 3, 2015

Indeed.

If anybody at the UFT/AFT/NYSUT actually thinks the Cuomo announcement today will lead to substantive changes to the reform agenda in New York, then they've fallen off a turnip truck.

But I suspect the the UFT hailed the Cuomo announcement because it gives them cover for continuing to support CCSS and Endless Testing in New York - now they can say, Hey we've got a commission coming to "fix" all the problems with them.

Sure we do...

Hillary Clinton Touts Her Education Reformer Credentials In Ads In Iowa, New Hampshire

Tell me again why the American Federation of Teachers endorsed Hillary Clinton 16 months before the 2016 presidential election?

Hillary Clinton’s first set of campaign ads will begin airing Tuesday in Iowa and New Hampshire as her campaign tries to get ahead of an anticipated onslaught of Republican attacks come the fall.

...

The ads will air in Des Moines and Cedar Rapids, Iowa's two largest markets, and in the Boston/Manchester and Burlington, Vt., markets, which together reach all of New Hampshire.

Some content of the ads:

In HRC's 1st ads, narrator says she "fought 4 school reform" in AR & she describes teacher who brought food 4 her mom http://t.co/Gjxt406s2i

— Josh Eidelson (@josheidelson) August 3, 2015

This is Classic Clinton triangulation - "there was this great teacher who brought food for my mom when she was hungry...but I also fought for school reforms that, in large part, blame teachers for the problems in public education."

There's a sketchy PAC out there that appears to be linked to Clinton that is calling itself "Americas Teachers" that bills itself as "pro-union, pro-reform."

Clinton's first campaign ads appear to be following the same script - pro-teacher/union and pro-reform.

To which I say:

@mma718 @KingsParkAE @americateachers @rweingarten @TeacherArthurG @leoniehaimson Pro-union, pro-reform? Pro-jive.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) August 3, 2015

Randi Weingarten: Christie's A Bully With Anger Management Issues

AFT President Randi Weingarten, presumably one of the recipients of the "punch in the face" Candidate Chris Christie wants to give to national teachers unions, released the following statement about Christie:

American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten reacted to Christie after the Republican governor said over the weekend the group deserves a punch in the face. The union leader criticized Christie for promoting a culture of violence.

"Chris Christie has issues—from reneging on his promise to fix pensions to his state's fiscal standing facing near junk bond status. But the biggest issue is he's a bully and has anger management problems," Weingarten said in a statement.

 "That he would threaten to punch teachers in the face — mostly women seeking to help children meet their potential and achieve their dreams — promotes a culture of violence and underscores why he lacks the temperament and emotional skills to be president, or serve in any leadership capacity," she said. "It's a sad day in the life of our nation to see a candidate threaten violence to gain political favor."

Weingarten doesn't use the word "misogynist" in her statement, but clearly that sentiment is there:  "That he would threaten to punch teachers in the face — mostly women seeking to help children meet their potential and achieve their dreams — promotes a culture of violence."

And indeed, he does seem to take a certain glee in blowing up on women, as this infamous incident from 2013 with the attendant photo shows:

Yesterday, the NJEA called for Christie to resign as governor.

57% of New Jersey residents were in agreement with that sentiment as measured by a July Monmouth poll.

Personally I think the more Christie tries to relieve the Glory Days of his early governorship where he beat up on teachers and union members weekly in his infamous town hall videos, the better.

This stuff isn't helping him in the 2016 GOP Presidential Primary, not with Donald Trump have superseded Christie's old act with a much more outrageous (and new) act of his own.

The teacher-bashing just speaks to where Christie stands these days politically post-BridgeGate - trying to live in the old "Glory Days" while the rest of the political world has moved past him.

His teacher-bashing misogyny act doesn't play well anymore - not in New Jersey with voters (where he got booed by 61,000 yesterday - twice) and not in the GOP primary where he lags at the bottom of the race as a political has-been.

But what else can a governor from a state with an economy in the toilet, an infrastructure in tatters, and an electorate furious at him do but try and relive the old days?

Randi Weingarten Engineers A Putsch In A Florida Local Union

You teachers still pissed about the lack of transparency and democracy in the AFT endorsement of Hillary Clinton for president are going to get a lot of laughs out of this story:

Orange County Classroom Teachers Association President Diana Moore, union officers and the board of directors have been relieved of their duties, according to officials with the American Federation of Teachers.

The AFT announced Wednesday that its executive council voted to place the OCCTA on administratorship and relieve Moore and others of their duties, saying, "The action follows a year of dealing with officer and member complaints about the erosion of democratic rights and the increasing dysfunction of their local union, and attempting every voluntary mechanism to right the ship."

The AFT executive council voted to take the action.

“The AFT and the Florida Education Association have exhausted every possible effort to help the union operate by its own bylaws. The current president, Diana Moore, has refused to comply, believing she is above the union’s governing documents. This has led to members’ rights being denied, their voices not being heard, member services being diminished, and an increasingly dysfunctional union,” AFT President Randi Weingarten said in a press release. “Today’s action, while permitted under the AFT constitution, is rarely exercised. It’s intended as a temporary measure to restore credibility and order and to return democratic rights to members.”

More on the absurdity of using the words "Weingarten," "credibility" and "democratic rights" in one sentence in a future post.

For now I want to stick to the story as we have it.

First, here's why the AFT claimed they took this action:

The national president said officials spent months investigating and found financial concerns, but
the biggest issue was that Moore wasn’t following the bylaws and forced them to re-run four elections because she interfered and campaigned on the clock.

Investigators findings showed Moore "made unbudgeted purchases exceeding $1,000 without board approval."

To avoid getting approval, Moore would allegedly use a union credit card "that draws payments directly from the OCCTA's money market account."

AFT leaders said Moore used union resources and emails to push for candidates she endorsed in the elections she interfered with.

"There was an allegation she was working on the clock doing union business and in schools while campaigning at the same time. That's inappropriate," Andy Ford of the Florida Education Association said.

"There was a repeated and systemic and intentional interference with elections, even when those elections had been supervised by the state affiliates,” Weingarten said.

Repeated, systemic and intentional interference with elections?

You don't say.

I wonder if Moore increased the weight of retiree votes the way the UFT did here in New York.

In any case, I dunno if the financial impropriety story is real or Weingarten-engineered b.s. because another story reports this:

The Orange County Classroom Teacher's Association represents 13,000 teachers and appeared to be doing a good job for its members when it came to contract negotiations.  But officials from the union's national office said the inner workings of the Orange County CTA were dysfunctional and consistently violated the union's bylaws. Most of the blame was placed on the union's president, Diana Moore.

"Diana believed that her way was the way as opposed to following rules, regulations, bylaws and constitution of her local," said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

Officials with the AFT said while there was no financial impropriety, Moore denied members their voice and improperly influenced the union's elections.

Ah, yes - the classic AFT/UFT/NYSUT muddle.

Some say this, some say that, but no one really knows because there's conflicting information out there meant to distract and divert.

Regardless for why Moore was the target of a Weingarten putsch, I do know that clearly the AFT leadership meant business:

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. —A local teacher's union saw its leadership team gutted this week and officials from the national office are in town to take over.

The Orange County teachers union president and board of directors have been let go because many members reportedly felt their voice wasn't being heard.

The takeover of the Orange County teachers union by the national union was drastic. A locksmith was called to change all the locks in the building and a spokeswoman said the president and the board of directors were no longer allowed in the building.

Yeah, they brought in the locksmiths to change the locks.

Nice, eh?

Moore, the deposed president of the local, was on vacation at the time of the putsch and didn't know she had been whacked until after the fact:

Moore told Channel 9 that she is on vacation and was unaware of the decision.

“As a dues-paying union member, I was not afforded the opportunity to have representation all throughout this matter. What I have tried to do is preserve the rights and due process of all members of Orange County Classroom Teachers Association. I’m shocked that the national union does not honor a paying union member’s rights to due process. Our members in Orange County are quite happy with their union. NEA has remained silent despite reaching out for support. This is all about members and money. They’re losing members and money in the national organization. It’s politics at its worst,” Moore said in a statement to Channel 9.

As for where things go from here:

The national union's vice president, Dennis Kelly, will be brought in from California to serve as interim leader. The officials from the national union say they do not believe Orange County teachers have suffered any significant harm from the issues with their local leadership. The Orange County CTA recently negotiated one of the highest contract settlements in the state.

Gee, Moore must have been terrible, having just negotiated one of the highest contracts in the state.

No wonder Weingarten had her goons jet down to Orange County and whack her out of a job.

Perhaps Moore was tampering as the AFT leaders claim.

Perhaps she was engaged in financial impropriety, as one story says the AFT claimed.

Or perhaps Weingarten and her Unity goons didn't like Moore and wanted her out.

I'm sure we'll get more on the story in the near future, but as with most stories involving the AFT or Randi Weingarten, we'll have to work closely to pull the nuggets of truth out of all the b.s.

More as we get it.

And more on the laugh riot of Weingarten whacking a local president and board for a lack of transparency, eroding the democratic rights of members and silencing rank and file voices in a future post.

That's a hoot, isn't it?

Randi Weingarten Touts Access To Voting

AFT President Weingarten on Twitter:

Voting is the cornerstone of our democracy. Elected officials shld encourage, not block access to the ballot #NCVotingRights #ThisIsOurSelma

— Randi Weingarten (@rweingarten) July 14, 2015

Voting is the cornerstone of democracy says Randi - oh, the irony, coming after the furor of the last few days.

She's right, of course.

Voting is the cornerstone of democracy - it's the way we get to have a say in how we are governed.

Would have been nice to get some say in the AFT endorsement process for the 2016 election.

Instead, like everything that the AFT and/or UFT does, the process was tightly controlled and kept in the hands of a select few beholden to Randi Weingarten.

If Weingarten were honest, she'd tweet something along the lines of "Loyalty oaths are the cornerstone of AFT democracy - we control everything via the loyalty oath and patronage system."

Because that's how this endorsement went down, despite the leadership protests to the contrary about polling members.

Thing is, the curtain was pulled back a little with the Clinton endorsement and the backlash - many people were able to see how the union is run by the leadership with little regard for what the rank and file members think, feel or want.

The counterattack from the leadership to the backlash - which amounts to, too bad if you don't like the Clinton endorsement - has only underscored how little the leadership thinks or cares about the rank and file.

But reckoning is coming, you can be sure of that.

The Supreme Court has taken up the Friedrichs case and is widely expected to rule that people cannot be forced to pay union dues.

Let's see how well the AFT leadership strategy of "You don't like what we do, too bad!" works in a post-Friedrichs world where union dues can no longer be compelled.

You'd think the AFT leadership would be concerned about this and be adjusting their strategy now, treating the rank and file with courtesy and concern instead of with their customary disdain and contempt.

But you'd be wrong if you think that they might adjust pre-Friedrichs.

Instead it's same old same old, with Weingarten talking democracy and voting rights and all that good stuff on the Internet and in speeches while continuing to run the AFT like a Stalinist.

Perhaps Weingarten and the cronies and yes people around her are incapable of adjustment.

Perhaps the arrogance they suffer from does not allow for adjustment.

Whatever the case, they're simply doubling down on how they run the union, calling all the shots, insulting and/or shouting down anybody who doesn't agree with them, and continuing down the road to extinction.

Like I wrote earlier this week, I'll continue paying my dues because I think it's the right thing to do - but you can bet a whole bunch of other people will quit paying the minute they can.

Let's see how "powerful" the AFT leadership is when the dues money these parasites live off of gets cut in half.

Feel The Bern NYC Meet-Up

That's right! We are the People for Bernie Sanders. He is the only presidential candidate that is truly a champion for the people. We are tired of talking puppets reading from a script. We are ready for a political revolution. We are ready for Bernie and boy do we #FeelTheBern! Join us to be a part of it to! At this momentous event, us Bernie supporters will be meeting with each other and sharing our stories, and then we will watch and listen to Bernie's live message about what is coming next. By the end of the night, we will all have had the chance to take the next steps to help elect Bernie Sanders as our next president. 


July 29

The Royal NYC

127 4th Ave, New York, New York 10003

Details here.

If you're angry about the top-down AFT leaders decision to endorse Hillary Clinton 16 months out from the election, this is a great opportunity to show the AFT leadership that there is plenty of rank and file member support for other candidates.

AFT Leaders Say, You Don't Like The Hillary Clinton Endorsement, Too Bad (UPDATED)

UPDATED - 8:50 AM: Megan Moskop, the teacher with whom Leo was engaging, writes to say that Leo was talking about the caucus structure within the union, not the union itself. 

If so, he wasn't doing a very good job of it because it reads as if he was talking about the union as a whole, not the caucuses within.

No matter what Leo was talking about (and given Leo's convolutions, it's often hard to know), the dismissive attitude, the scorn for member concerns and the refusal to hear anybody else's critiques remains, as does the looming issue of what happens if the Supreme Court rules against unions in Friedrichs next year.

If the AFT/UFT/NYSUT leadership does not make a course correction in how it deals with members concerns and criticism, they will find fewer and fewer members as time goes in.

That would be an awful thing to have happen, but it doesn't seem the AFT leadership is too worried because they continue to treat the rank and file like serfs to be ruled from above.

Original Post:

AFT Leaders Say, You Don't Like The Hillary Endorsement, You're Free To Leave The Union 

A functionary of the American Federation of Teachers explains how AFT members have no right to public dissent of  AFT leadership decisions and if they don't like what the AFT leadership did by endorsing Hillary Clinton for president 16 months out, they're free to leave the union:

@msmoskop @BiancaTanis @nysut @AFTunion decision making becuz everyone goes & does what they want regardless. In democracy you respect the

— Leo Casey (@LeoECasey) July 13, 2015

@msmoskop @BiancaTanis @nysut @AFTunion democratic decision and abide by it. If you can't abide by it, then you always have right to leave

— Leo Casey (@LeoECasey) July 13, 2015

@msmoskop @BiancaTanis @nysut @AFTunion and join a different organization or not be part of any organization.

— Leo Casey (@LeoECasey) July 13, 2015

That's Leo Casey, Randi Weingarten's long-time propaganda guy, telling AFT member Megan Moskop why she has no right to complain about the "democratic decision" reached by the autocratic leadership of the American Federation of Teachers, with its "executive board" controlled by AFT President Randi Weingarten voting "democratically" for the endorsement of Hillary Clinton after the union used Hillary Clinton's pollsters to poll a little over a thousand AFT members and use this as justification for the endorsement 16 months out from the election.

It's interesting that Leo Casey would suggest AFT members who don't like the AFT leadership's decision on the Clinton endorsement leave the union, because that's exactly the thing that might happen next year if the Supreme Court rules in the Friedrichs case that teachers cannot be compelled to pay union dues and have those dues used for lobbying or other business they do not agree with.

If you go back through Perdido Street School blog here, you'll see various commenters talk about wanting to leave the union, decertify the union, start their own union and/or otherwise hope for RICO charges for the current union leadership because they feel disenfranchised by the AFT/UFT/NYSUT leadership.

The big complaint for many AFT/UFT/NYSUT members is that union leaders do not listen to concerns of the rank and file, that they make top-down decisions and attack anybody who disagrees with them.

The Hillary Clinton endorsement is just the latest "Hey, you don't like what we do? Too @#$%ing bad!" response from the AFT leadership, with the cranky Leo Casey dishing out the smack down.

You would think given the enormity of the Friedrichs case, the union leadership would be more amenable to member concerns, that they would be thinking, "Hey, we could lose the right to compel members dues, so maybe, you know, we should start to work with members instead of work on them...maybe we should be more member-responsive instead of member-dismissive when the rank and file raise concerns."

You would think they might react that way, given Friedrichs, but you'd be wrong - instead it's just the usual defensive response, part condescension/part insult, that if you don't like what the AFT does, leave it, if you don't abide by the top-down imposed "democratic" decision from the AFT leadership, you're an anarchist.

The next insult - usually the last one the AFT leadership and/or their functionaries level in fights with members - is that you're anti-union if you don't support the leadership's decisions, and you can bet that's coming next from Leo and Company (I know because I've had that leveled at me on Twitter when I've criticized AFT/UFT/NYSUT strategy or decisions in the past.)

Casey may just get his wish next year after the Supreme Court ruling on Friedrichs if teachers are given the choice to pay union dues or not, and while I think it would be a mistake for teachers to stop paying dues to the AFT because the union leaders run the union for themselves only and are completely unresponsive to members' concerns or criticisms, you can see why some might do it.

Who wants to pay the salary, perks and second pensions of autocrats like Weingarten and Casey as they make top-down decisions that members consider harmful to their interests, then dismiss member concerns with insults and "Hey, you don't like it, leave!" retorts?

I was hoping that the AFT leadership would start to become more responsive to members with the Freidrichs case looming next year, that they would feel the need to engage with members over concerns and criticism rather than just do the usual insult/dismissal game, but it seems, given the Casey pushback to the Clinton endorsement decision, this will not be the case.

Instead we are being told if AFT members don't like the decision, they can leave the union and go elsewhere.

It will be interesting to see how many take Leo up on his invitation if the Supreme Court rules against unions in the Freidrichs case.

I'm betting many will.

And then AFT leaders will call these people names, claim they are anti-union or whatever, instead of thinking, "You know, maybe we can't run the union the way we always have anymore, maybe we actually, you know, have to listen to members instead of just dismiss them and do what we want..."

It is a real shame that the AFT leadership does not seem to see the disaster that is coming down the pike if they continue to run the union for their own benefit, ambition and aggrandizement.

As I wrote earlier, I won't stop paying dues nor take Leo up on his invitation to leave the AFT but given the disenfrachisement many rank and filers feel toward the union, I would bet many others do.

The AFT leadership believes itself untouchable, what with the rigged election processes wherein loyalty oaths and dished out perks and privileges are used to keep the union functionaries in lie and continue to support the leadership.

But see how well that works if and when the rank and file are given a choice to pay dues or not.

Randi Weingarten On The Defense, But She's Pretty Sure It'll All Die Down

You can see from Randi Weingarten's Twitter feed and Facebook page that she's feeling some of the heat after the AFT announced it had endorsed Hillary Clinton for president 16 months out from the election.

The AFT is the first major labor organization to announce an endorsement for 2016.

There is a lot of talk on the Internet that this could really be the watershed moment when AFT members finally realize Randi Weingarten and the AFT leadership doesn't care about them , that they see the union only as a vehicle for their own benefit, advancement and aggrandizement.

A commenter here at Perdido Street School says - nahh:

Stop. RANDI WILL CONTINUE TO BE THE LEADER OF THE AFT, WILL CONTINUE TO BE FOISTED ABOUT AS THE FACE AND VOICE OF ORGANIZED TEACHERS AND WILL CONTINUE TO SELL US OUT. Why? Because she knows that teachers don't have what it takes to remove her. And we don't. She has F'd us soooooo many times and what did we do (besides complain)? Yup. Nothing. Same goes for NYSUT. We had an RA this year. Not a peep. Turns out teachers were only a strong and formidable political force when it was easy...when leadership was loud and we weren't so removed from the labor movement's origins....and when we didn't face existential threats. We are going to lose it all. Period. Full stop. We cant even get our unions on our side. We don't have what it takes
Sorry folks. We kind of suck. We don't even know what a rampart is, let alone know how to storm one. This is what it looks like when a generation or two don't meet the challenge of their time.

What say you out there - watershed moment for many in the AFT or just another one of those moments when people get angry for a while, then it all dies down?

How Rigged Was The AFT Endorsement Process?

Gadfly on the Wall:

The manner in which this endorsement was reached is somewhat mysterious.

This much seems certain:

1) The AFT executive board invited all of the candidates to meet with them and submit to an interview. No Republican candidates responded.

2) Democrats including Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley and Clinton were interviewed in private.

3) The executive committee voted to endorse Clinton.

4) NOW the interviews are scheduled to be released to the public.

This is a perplexing timetable. Why would the AFT endorse BEFORE releasing the interviews? Ostensibly, the executive council used these interviews to help make its decision. Shouldn’t that same information have been available to rank and file members of the union before an endorsement was made?

Nahh - because given Randi Weingarten's relationship with Bonnie and Clyde, er, Bill and Hillary, the endorsement was always going to be Hillary Clinton.

The interviews were a sham, the polling the AFT claims to have conducted around the endorsement was a sham, the timetable was a sham and the endorsement was a sham.

AFT leaders just happened to make it even more of a sham by announcing the endorsement so far out.

More from Gadfly:

Which polls produced which results? The press release says AFT members prefer Clinton 3-1. But even if Clinton came out on top consistently, surely the results weren’t identical on every poll. Maybe she got 75% on one and 65% on another.

The AFT hasn’t released everything, but the organization’s website gives us a memo about ONE of these phone surveys. This national survey of membership planning to vote in Democratic primaries found 67% picked Clinton. However, only 1,150 members participated! That’s a far cry from the more than 1 million cited in the press release.

...

But that’s only one survey. Where is the rest of the data? Where is the raw information from this survey? Where is the data from all these other outreach attempts and on-line activities? How many took phone surveys? How many took on-line surveys? And what were the results in each case?

If union members really did endorse Clinton, that’s fine. But many of us would like to see the proof.

There is no other data - the union conducted one poll, geared the questions to an outcome they had already decided upon, and used this as "proof" that 1.6 million AFT members wanted Hillary Clinton endorsed.

The process was rigged for an outcome Weingarten wanted.

The Hillary Clinton endorsement 16 months out from the actual election is just the latest example of how the AFT is a sham union run by sham union leaders who see the union as a vehicle for their own ambitions, aggrandizement, and financial benefit.

This Member Of The AFT Does Not Endorse Hillary Clinton For President

@lapham_katie @TeacherArthurG @sullio @perdidostschool @StevenSinger3 @teka21bat @Stoptesting15 @fraublucher606 pic.twitter.com/Bc3Qbuu7HC

— Bianca Tanis (@BiancaTanis) July 12, 2015
Starting the movement, to take back the union, to take back political power, to expose the AFT/UFT/NYSUT leadership as the political functionaries and expedients they are.

Say NO to Hillary Clinton.

AFT Throws Away L:everage By Endorsing Hillary Clinton 16 Months Out

I'm on the road, so blogging is light, but I cannot let the news that the AFT endorsed the pro-Common Core, pro-charter school Hillary Clinton for president go by without a post.

First, the official news:

The American Federation of Teachers is endorsing Hillary Clinton.

The endorsement was expected from the 1.6 million-member union, which represents workers including teachers, nurses and college and university employees.

On Twitter, Weingarten addressed the early endorsement. “Members want to shape the debate, not chase it. 79% of primary voters want us to endorse in the primary,” she tweeted.

AFT said it conducted a long, thoughtful process before making its decision. Members had multiple opportunities to weigh in on the decision. Some 79 percent who vote in Democratic primaries said the union should endorse a candidate, and Clinton was the favorite by a three-to-one margin.
The National Education Association, the nation’s larger teachers’ union with nearly 3 million members, hasn’t made a decision about its endorsement, and one isn’t expected until the fall. It did not endorse either Clinton or Barack Obama in 2008.

Jeb Bush raised over a hundred million dollars for the primary campaign so far - you can bet he'll raise a ton more as the campaign goes on.

Given the fundraising, Bush remains a good shot to be the eventual GOP nominee for 2016.

By endorsing Hillary Clinton this early, the AFT can be taken for granted by the Clinton campaign for the rest of the campaign cycle.

God forbid Randi Weingarten and the sellouts at the AFT would say, "You know, Hillary talked a good game when we were met with her, but so did Barack Obama when we met with him and so did Bill Clinton when we met with him and in each of those instances we remember that actions did not match the words.  So we're withholding an endorsement and will NOT work for Hillary Clinton UNTIL we are assured she will NOT continue her husband's, George Bush's and Barack Obama's pro-privatization, anti-public education policies.  If we are not assured of this, we will NOT work for Hillary Clinton and will work to make sure that other labor groups do not as well."

Instead of playing some hardball and showing Clinton why the AFT shouldn't be taken for granted, the AFT announced an endorsement 16 months before the election, six months before the first caucus/primary.

Nobody I know is surprised by the AFT endorsement - Weingarten's closeness to the Clintons all but assured that.

But to announce the endorsement this early, to do so without any assurances from Clinton that she will support public schools except for some meaningless campaign rhetoric in a statement throws away leverage the union could have used against Clinton as things tighten in the campaign.

This is a pattern for the AFT/UFT/NYSUT - throwing away leverage and giving the neoliberal politicians what they want.

We saw this with the UFT when they endorsed Merryl Tisch's pal Bill Thompson in the NYC mayoral primary and we saw it with NYSUT and the UFT when they refused to endorse Zephyr Teachout against Andrew Cuomo in last year's gubernatorial election and threatened the Working Families Party with dissolution if Teachout was given the party nod.  We saw it too when Weingarten helped out the Cuomo campaign buy calling for Cuomo's troubled running mate, Kathy Hochul.

There is never a moment in time when the AFT/UFT/NYSUT leadership doesn't go out of their way to throw out their political leverage, to take political actions that make the unions inconsequential, to sell out the rank and file for their own political expediency.

Weingarten loves access and she loves media attention - the Clinton endorsement gives her both.

But it doesn't give the AFT rank-and-file any political benefit as whatever political leverage we had gets thrown away 16 months early.

As such, it is a just another example of why the AFT is an inconsequential union that may go the way of the dinosaurs when the Supreme Court weighs in on the Friedrichs case.

New York's Assembly Line Teaching

A serious of tweets with Arthur Goldstein, Tim Farley and Randi Weingarten on the state of teaching in New York today:

@rweingarten @JudithMalys #CommonCore is a big part of why they don't feel respected. Teacher autonomy is gone in this country.

— Tim Farley (@tfarley1969) June 28, 2015

@TeacherArthurG @tfarley1969 @rweingarten @JudithMalys Top-down imposed curriculum comes w/ it in many schools.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) June 29, 2015

@TeacherArthurG @tfarley1969 @rweingarten @JudithMalys Coupled w/ constant Danielson eval, like Lucy on assembly line.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) June 29, 2015

@TeacherArthurG @tfarley1969 @rweingarten @JudithMalys Or the Little Tramp in Modern Times - https://t.co/IqThFflvm9

— rbe (@perdidostschool) June 29, 2015

Truth is, teaching in many New York schools these days is EXACTLY like the Little Tramp on the assembly line in Modern Times, especially when the EngageNY curriculum is used:

Close read incomprehensible piece, ask text-based questions about excerpt, close read same incomprehensible piece (sometimes same incomprehensible excerpt!), ask text-based questions about it, repeat ad nauseam until final assessment that tests retention of said material.

Have a lesson plan printed out with EVERY step, EVERY activity timed to the second, EVERY question asked of students with expected (and necessary) responses under them, EVERY activity ending in an assessment, EVERY do now activity text-based and "rigorous" (drill-and-kill starts from the very beginning of class and goes right to the end) - this is the daily experience of many teachers in New York's schools.

And God help you if you're slated for a Danielson drive-by observation on the day when you decide to deviate from the above assembly line teaching - you're almost guaranteed a "developing" or "ineffective" evaluation for the lesson in many schools.

Randi Weingarten says teachers feel disrespected and need to be respected?

Respect starts and ends with the autonomy to write curriculum, teach that curriculum as one sees fit, assess students as one sees fit, have the freedom to deviate from teaching methods and lesson plans imposed from above, and not be forced to teach from a lesson plan so completely controlled and rote that it sucks the life and soul out of the learning and the classroom.

Alas, Randi Weingarten and union leaders, through their collaboration with education reformers, have brought us the current assembly line teaching mess.

Randi Weingarten thinks teachers need to be respected?

Great - she should start respecting teachers herself by ceasing to "collaborate" with reformers on reforms that strip teachers of autonomy, creativity, and professionalism.

End the assembly line teaching and evaluations.

NYSUT President Magee: We Could Support Chris Gibson For Governor

From a NY Times profile of Representative Chris Gibson (R):

Mr. Gibson has shown himself to be a wild card on state matters, too: As a vocal critic of Common Core education standards, the third-term lawmaker has taken issue with Mr. Cuomo’s recent attacks on teachers’ unions, a traditionally Democratic-leaning constituency. “Teachers are not the problem,” Mr. Gibson said.

Karen E. Magee, president of the New York State United Teachers, which has supported Mr. Gibson in the past, said he would have a “good chance” of winning the influential labor group’s backing for governor, if it were deciding on an endorsement today.

“He values and respects teachers and the work we do, and I would not say that that’s anywhere aligned with the current governor of the State of New York,” Ms. Magee said.

Until the teachers unions stop acting as functionaries of the Democratic Party and actually stick it to Dem politicians when they stick it to labor, the neo-liberal Dems controlling the party are going to continue to look for labor money/support then sell us out right after the election.

If only the unions had played coy before the 2014 election and, you know, not ensured the Working Families Party endorsed Cuomo over Zephyr Teachout or helped Kathy Hochul beat Teachout's running mate Tim Wu, maybe people would take them seriously when they make noise about not supporting Dems next time around.

As it stands now, I certainly don't take them seriously.

Report: Mulgrew Is Negotiating With Cuomo On His Own, Going Around NYSUT

Okay, I missed this extraordinary NT2 blog post from a few days ago.

I wish I hadn't - it's that extraordinary.

Read the whole piece, in its entirety over at NT2.

But the gist is this:

Cuomo's approval numbers have tanked because of his attacks on teachers.

People are conflating Common Core, the CCSS tests and Cuomo's push for teacher evaluations all into one and are blaming Cuomo for all three.

NT2 says the numbers would be even worse if NYSUT hadn't pulled their TV ads:

And think of what the drop might have been had NYSUT not pulled its TV ads a month ago. They were good ads. They featured women teachers speaking directly to Cuomo saying in effect: “How dare you say that I’m the problem.”

Nonetheless, Cuomo's getting hurt bad in this battle, even with the ads down.

But it doesn't matter, because no matter how weak Cuomo is at this moment, the UFT leadership is looking to help him out:

This post is actually about NYSUT, once the state’s most powerful union, but now a shell of itself due to internal conflict within its own ranks and with other teacher unions.  One would have thought that Cuomo’s unprecedented attack would have unified the teacher reps, but no.  They are still fragmented, still paralyzed, still seemingly unable to capitalize on this moment in which Cuomo seems so vulnerable on education policy.

(Even as we are writing this, the UFT’s Mike Mulgrew is negotiating with Cuomo’s office on his own, going around NYSUT.)

NT2 blog ends the post with this:

The entity that may capitalize on Cuomo’s vulnerability, however, is the Assembly.  Now that the Assembly has taken ethics off the table, it’s free to do what it wants to do – a wholesale re-write of Cuomo education policies.

Cuomo, stung by the poll, and wanting mainly and perhaps only an ethics victory, might go along. NYSUT would benefit, although not as a result of its own efforts. It will simply luck out.

I've been pointing out for weeks now how the union leadership has been fighting a half-assed battle against Cuomo instead of going for his throat.

Now we know why.

The sellout is being negotiated by Mike Mulgrew and the UFT leadership.

Time To Ask Randi Weingarten About The Kathy Hochul Robocalls Again

Back during the 2014 Democratic Primary for lieutenant governor, Cuomo's people started to worry that law professor Tim Wu, Zephy Teachout's running mate, could beat Cuomo's running mate, bank lobbyist Kathy Hochul.

Polls showed that Wu was indeed within striking distance, so the Cuomo campaign had some robocalls go out on her behalf.

One of the political personages taped for those robocalls was AFT President Randi Weingarten.

When Weingarten was criticized on Twitter for making robocalls for the Cuomo campaign (which is what these were, despite her claims to the contrary that they were only for Hochul), she said that Hochul was a reliable advocate for public education and she wanted to support Hochul for that.

There's news some morning that the reliable advocate for public education, former bank lobbyist and current lieutenant governor, Kathy Hochul will be one of the politicians feting Eva Moskowitz at her pro-charter rally today:

Gov. Cuomo, unlike last year, will skip a large pro-charter school rally at the Capitol on Wednedsay, but his new lieutenant governor will be there.

Lt. Gov. Kathleen Hochul is one of at least nine elected officials scheduled to be in attendance. Many are from the Bronx.

Also set to attend is Senate GOP Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Nassau County), Senate Independent Democratic Conference Leader Jeffrey Klein, Senate Education Committee Chairman John Flanagan (R-Suffolk County), Sen. Ruben Diaz (D-Bronx).

Among the Assembly members said to be coming is Marcos Crespo (D-Bronx), Michael Blake (D-Bronx), Ruben Sepulveda (D-Bronx), Robert Rodriguez (D-Manhattan ) and Mark Gjonaj (D-Bronx).

...

Cuomo, who last year attended the rally and is pushing a host of education reforms this year that includes a expansion of charter schools, will be in Rochester and Syracuse pushing Wednesday is plan to hike the minimum wage.

Let me ask Ms. Weingarten once more, why did she make robocalls for bank lobbyist, Cuomo running mate and charter shill Kathy Hochul?

These are robocalls that helped Hochul beat Tim Wu in the primary and now help push an anti-public education agenda.

Why would a union president who supposedly cares about public education make robocalls for a political campaign that is virulently anti-public education and anti-public school teacher?

The excuse that Hochul is an advocate for public schools doesn't work so well now that she's shilling for Eva Moskowitz and the charters.