RANDI WEINGARTEN AND THE UTLA SANDERS ENDORSEMENT
One of the many disasters related to the Hillary Clinton run for president – aside from the eventual election of Donald Trump – was the undemocratic way her early endorsement by the two national teacher unions, the NEA and the AFT, was forced down the throats of rank and file union members.
The endorsements of Hillary by the NEA and the AFT were made early in the primary campaign when Bernie Sanders was Hillary’s only opponent.
They were no-strings endorsements. Nothing was demanded from Hillary in return, even though Sanders’ record on education issues like charter schools was much stronger than Clinton’s.
The main argument made by the union leadership was her electability.
The eventual result demonstrated the fallacy of the electability argument. Electability continues to be used by union leaders as we saw in the early endorsement of Cook County Democratic Party Chairman Toni Preckwinkle for Chicago Mayor by the CTU. Preckwinkle was eventually soundly defeated by Mayor Lori Lighfoot six months ago.
Electable or not, the electabilty argument is used to conceal the undemocratic CONTINUE READING: Randi Weingarten and the UTLA Sanders endorsement. – Fred Klonsky