Posts tagged federal charter
Opinion: We can’t abolish America’s largest teachers union. But Congress can do something else
August 7, 2025 // If this is what happens when NEA completely controls an event and its programming, the union’s tremendous influence over classrooms is a five-alarm fire not just for public education, but the future of our country. Congressional action addressing the pernicious influence of the teachers unions is long overdue. That’s why I (Mr. Fitzgerald) and Sen. Cynthia Lummis from Wyoming have introduced the Stopping Teachers Unions from Damaging Education Needs Today (STUDENT) Act, which would overhaul the NEA’s federal charter to make the union more accountable and less partisan.
FREEDOM FOUNDATION APPLAUDS REP. FITZGERALD’S PROPOSAL TO OVERHAUL THE NEA’S FEDERAL CHARTER
July 19, 2023 // Some of the reforms include: prohibiting the NEA from engaging in electoral politics and lobbying, a restriction included in 60 percent of federal charters; requiring the NEA to submit an annual report to Congress; fully repealing the NEA’s D.C. property tax exemption; prohibiting the NEA from collecting dues from a public employee unless the employee has been notified of his or her right to refuse — and affirmatively consented — and require the NEA to collect dues without the use of government payroll systems; prohibiting taxpayer-funded release time for NEA officers; barring the NEA from incorporating the core tenets of Critical Race Theory into its governance, operations and advocacy; subjecting the NEA and its affiliates to the financial transparency requirements and union democracy protections of the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act; and, requiring the NEA to refrain from initiating, and to actively intervene to prevent, any strikes or work stoppages by its affiliates.
A charter by any other name
October 5, 2022 // In 1906, the federal government issued a federal charter to the National Education Association (NEA). This Congressional Charter was granted “for the purpose to elevate the character and advance the interests of the profession of teaching; and to promote the cause of education in the United States”. Other organizations that fall in the same category include Little League Baseball and the Girl Scouts of America. The NEA is the only labor union to hold such a charter, and they are only one of two organizations with a federal charter to have a Political Action Committee (PAC). The NEA charter was granted prior to any federal guidelines for charter approval, and there is an assumption that to keep this status it would now need to meet the requirements set forth in 1969, which include being, “organized and operated as a nonpartisan and nonprofit organization.” Clearly, this is not the case. Charles W. Baird wrote an extensive report on the NEA and why it no longer meets the criteria for a federal charter: