American Federation of Teachers

In May, a delegation from the CFT, the California affiliate of the AFT, arrived in London to the city’s iconic images: Big Ben, Westminster Abbey and the gothic spires of Parliament. But what felt most familiar was not the skyline. It was the struggle. British educators were confronting many of the same issues facing educators here at home: dwindling school funding, inadequate pay, looming layoffs and the rapid spread of artificial intelligence in classrooms.

WASHINGTON—AFT President Randi Weingarten issued the following statement in response to the U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing the Trump administration to end temporary protected status protections for thousands of workers from Haiti and Syria who live and work legally in the United States: “This country has been a beacon of hope for people around the world who seek a safe haven from violence and persecution.

A plan to close the inpatient maternity unit at Grady Memorial Hospital in Delaware County, Ohio, has drawn opposition from the Ohio Nurses Association and Delaware County residents. Their concerns were aired at a Delaware City Council meeting on June 23, where testimony from nurses, patients and community members led the council to approve an emergency resolution opposing the closure.

The Trump administration is trying to undermine the process for receiving federal funding for scientific research by using political appointees—instead of independent scientists—to approve research proposals, a move that would place projects on topics such as gender identity, climate change and public health at risk of losing out on federal funding.

WASHINGTON—In an open letter sent today to the nation's Democratic governors, the presidents of the country’s two largest teachers unions, the National Education Association and the AFT, urged Democratic governors to reject the Trump administration's private school voucher program, calling it a grave and urgent threat to the public schools that serve nearly 90 percent of the nation's K–12 students.

WASHINGTON—American Association of University Professors President Todd Wolfson and AFT President Randi Weingarten issued the following statement after the U.S. Department of Education announced it was moving critical functions to other federal agencies: “The Trump administration’s continued gutting of the Department of Education is a catastrophic attack on higher education.

AI doesn’t change the essential purpose of education: teaching students how to think. I can pinpoint the moment when my unease over young people drowning in technology—cellphones, social media, AI chatbots and the digital deluge—veered into outright alarm. I was talking with Jonathan Haidt, a researcher and the author of The Anxious Generation, when he was an AFT Book Club guest.

WASHINGTON—AFT President Randi Weingarten issued the following statement after the Department of Justice indicted 15 individuals, including at least one educator and union member, following U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s deadly Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis: “Freedom of speech and the right to peacefully protest are cornerstones of American society.

WASHINGTON—AFT President Randi Weingarten issued the following statement after the federal Department of Education announced it was moving two of its most crucial functions to the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Justice: “Today’s moves are a dagger to the heart of what the Department of Education was always supposed to do: protect the most vulnerable.

BALTIMORE—AFT-Maryland President Kenya Campbell and AFT President Randi Weingarten issued the following statement after two individuals were kidnapped by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers on Commodore John Rodgers Elementary/Middle School property in Southeast Baltimore. “Yesterday, the Commodore John Rodgers community was supposed to be celebrating. Instead, children were terrorized after their parents were disappeared by armed government thugs.