As the ugliest presidential campaign in almost a century comes to a merciful end, we get a glimpse into the inner workings of the biggest union in the country: the National Education Association.
Courtesy of WikiLeaks, we have learned that manipulation by NEA bosses helped to ensure that Hillary Clinton would be the union’s choice for Democratic presidential nominee.
On June 13, 2015, four days after Clinton announced her candidacy, her director of labor outreach Nikki Budzinski sent a memo to other campaign officials that discussed possible strategies for the upcoming NEA Representative Assembly, scheduled for the following month in Orlando.
Budzinski’s apprehensions were understandable. NEA had not taken any formal steps to find out who its rank-and-file actually preferred for the Democratic nomination, but it’s no secret that many in the union favored Sanders, citing the socialist’s “opposition to charter schools, support for collective bargaining rights and free tuition at public higher education institutions.”
Then on June 19th, Budzinski warned colleagues of an impending endorsement of Sanders by NEA’s Vermont affiliate. “NEA is concerned their VT affiliate could do a Tuesday (next week) recommendation of endorsement (with potential press release). This is not confirmed. The bigger concern is that RI and MA might go with VT as well.” While Budzinski went on to say that these states’ endorsement was not a “serious concern” for the Clinton endorsement, she felt it to be an “optics problem” and began to work behind the scenes with Carrie Pugh, NEA’s political director.