Six blocks north of the White House sits an eight-story office building topped with two flag poles. The sign over the entrance reads, “National Education Association Of The United States.”
Casual passers-by could be forgiven for mistaking the edifice as just another arm of the federal government. But this $50 million structure isn’t owned by taxpayers. In fact, it belongs to one of the nation’s largest and most persistent advocates for bigger, more expensive, less accountable, and radically more progressive government.
And, as the largest teachers’ union in the country, the National Education Association has accumulated resources and political influence few other special interests can match.
According to its annual financial disclosures, the NEA’s D.C. headquarters alone spent more than $167 million of members’ dues on politics, lobbying and contributions in the 2023-24 academic year, almost exclusively benefiting Democrat candidates, leftist ballot measures, and progressive advocacy groups. It raised and spent another $4 million in members’ contributions to its federal political committee during the 2023-24 election cycle.
The NEA isn’t just aligned with Democrats; it sets the national progressive agenda. It backs abortion on demand and supports restrictions to Second Amendment rights. In 2023, while protesting education reforms championed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, NEA president Becky Pringle proclaimed, “our students do not need protection from drag queens.” The union actively works to inject books with political messaging and controversial content into public school libraries and curriculum while fighting efforts to protect students from inappropriate material.
Long before it became popular on the left in 2020, the NEA supported defunding the police, opposed voter ID requirements and claimed only white people can be racist.
So how is it that such a divisive, partisan special interest organization can call itself the National Education Association, as though it represents some national consensus or performs an official function for the public good?
The reason is the federal charter granted to the organization by Congress in 1906.
According to the NEA, its history began with the formation of the National Teachers Association in 1857. It started going by its “modern name” following the NTA’s merger with several other organizations in 1870.
City records indicate the organization incorporated in the District of Columbia in 1886 under the name, “National Education Association” — an incorporation it retains to this day.
Then, in 1906, the NEA persuaded Congress to grant it a federal charter as well. The union’s charter, still codified in U.S. law, recognized it for the first time as the “National Education Association of the United States.” While the NEA is now one of only 95 federally chartered corporations, it is the only labor union with such a distinction.
As the Congressional Research Service points out, a federal charter confers a “perceived seal of approval” and, without “ongoing oversight,” members of Congress “face a reputational risk in the event of a scandal.”
In this case, the NEA’s charter does not include the kinds of safeguards and accountability mechanisms found in the charters of many other organizations — like the Little League, U.S. Olympic Committee, and the VFW — designed to ensure these entities remain unifying fixtures of America’s national identity.
This underlying defect, and Congress’ failure to adequately police the NEA since, has resulted in the union becoming the controversial political player it is today.
In response to the NEA’s growing extremism, congressional Republicans have periodically proposed repealing the union’s charter. Though symbolically important, the loss of its federal charter would have little discernable effect on the NEA’s existence or operations, other than perhaps forcing it to remove “of the United States” from its building’s signage.
A new congressional proposal introduced in July by Rep. Scott Fitzgerald (R-Wis.) and Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) would be far more consequential.
Based on Freedom Foundation recommendations, the Student Act would rewrite the NEA’s federal charter to make it more accountable and less partisan.
Much of the bill borrows from provisions commonly found in other federal charters, such as limitations on political advocacy, provisions for greater congressional oversight, and meaningful enforcement mechanisms.
The rest of the bill addresses some of the NEA’s uniquely odious practices stemming from its status as a labor union. Such reforms include subjecting the NEA and its affiliates to the financial transparency and union democracy protections already applied by federal law to private-sector unions, requiring the union to forgo commonly sought forms of taxpayer support, and requiring it to respect educators’ First Amendment right to refrain from joining the union at all.
All told, the Student Act would fundamentally change the NEA as it exists today. And although the NEA might not have to change the sign on its headquarters, Beltway pedestrians may be more likely to see only the American flag flying from its roof.
Aaron Withe is CEO of the Freedom Foundation. Tiffany Justice is executive vice president of Heritage Action for America.
