Two new reports from the education watchdog group Defending Education lay bare what critics have long suspected: the nation's largest teachers unions have operated as a massive political spending operation, directing more than $1 billion toward liberal advocacy groups, Democratic campaigns, and progressive causes over the past decade, all funded substantially by dues collected from classroom educators.

The research, first reported by Fox News Digital, tracks spending from the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, along with their state-level affiliates, using federal filings and campaign finance records. At the national level alone, the NEA and AFT directed roughly $669 million toward left-wing political groups, advocacy organizations, and campaigns since 2015. Factor in state and local affiliates, and the total crosses the billion-dollar mark.

That is not a typo. One billion dollars, from organizations that tell the public they exist to fight for better pay and smaller class sizes.

Where the money went

The Defending Education reports trace a sprawling web of recipients. More than $85 million flowed directly to Democratic Party entities at the federal, state, and local levels, and that figure excludes individual candidate contributions. Tens of millions more went to the Senate Majority PAC and House Majority PAC, the party's primary vehicles for electing Democrats to Congress.

Beyond direct party support, the unions bankrolled an array of progressive organizations. The State Engagement Fund received more than $60 million. For Our Future Action Fund and its affiliates collected more than $40 million. Other recipients included Color of Change + PAC, Indivisible, the National Center for Transgender Equality, Planned Parenthood, the Sixteen Thirty Fund, the New Venture Fund, and the Human Rights Campaign Foundation.

The unions also funded climate initiatives and ballot campaigns opposing school choice, often routing money through nonprofit groups and political action committees.

Read that list again. Planned Parenthood. Transgender advocacy. Dark-money clearinghouses like the Sixteen Thirty Fund and New Venture Fund, which have funneled hundreds of millions through the progressive ecosystem for years. Whatever these causes are, they have nothing to do with helping a fourth-grade teacher in Ohio get a raise or reducing overcrowding in a middle school in Georgia.

'Show me your budget and I will show you what you value'

Rhyen Staley, research director at Defending Education, did not mince words when describing the findings. He told Fox News Digital:

"Show me your budget and I will show you what you value; and what the teachers unions value is political power and advancing a left wing, social justice agenda. Parents, families, and communities have little to no counter to the influence that teachers union dollars have on state and local campaigns. Gone are the days of unions just advocating for higher wages, better working conditions, and good health insurance; they are a political machine focused on fomenting a 'political revolution.'"

That phrase, "political machine", is worth sitting with. These are not organizations that occasionally dabble in politics on the side. A billion dollars over a decade represents a sustained, deliberate infrastructure built to advance progressive policy at every level of government. The classroom is the fundraising mechanism. The politics is the product.

The broader pattern of Democratic institutional dysfunction has been hard to miss lately. Even figures within the party have acknowledged the drift. Rahm Emanuel recently joined a growing chorus of Democrats admitting the party has "lost the plot", and the teachers union spending trail helps explain how the plot got lost in the first place.

The bait-and-switch

Nicole Neily, president of Defending Education, framed the findings as a fundamental betrayal of rank-and-file educators. She stated:

"It's time to dispense with the myth that unions care whatsoever about teachers' best interests. Educators are victims of a bait-and-switch: instead of their dues going to advocate for increased pay or improved working environments, they're being spent advancing a hard-left political agenda, underwriting causes such as climate change, gender activism, and abortion (as well as supporting progressive politicians at all levels)."

Neily also called for greater transparency on union spending, arguing it is "absolutely critical so that policymakers and teachers themselves can make informed decisions about the role that these entities should, or should not, play in the future." After fifty years of entrenched union influence in the education system, she said, the public deserves a clear accounting.

The transparency argument cuts deep because so many teachers have no practical choice in the matter. In states without right-to-work protections, educators often must pay union dues or fees as a condition of employment. Their money gets swept into a political apparatus they may not support, backing candidates and causes they may actively oppose. The billion-dollar figure is not just a story about institutional power. It is a story about individual teachers whose paychecks subsidize a political agenda they never voted for.

That kind of institutional capture has consequences far beyond education. Hillary Clinton recently resurfaced to pitch Democrats a midterm playbook, but the unions have been writing their own playbook for decades, with other people's money.

Mobilization ahead of May Day

The spending revelations arrive as unions and allied organizations ramp up mobilization efforts ahead of May Day protests. Fox News Digital previously reported that teachers unions played a role in preparing for large-scale demonstrations, with activists framing the events as part of a broader "political revolution."

Ryan Walters, CEO of the Teacher Freedom Alliance, offered a blunt assessment earlier this year. He told Fox News Digital:

"It's very clear that teachers unions seek to destroy our country by turning our students against it."

That is a strong claim. But the spending data gives it real weight. When a teachers union sends millions to Indivisible or Color of Change rather than negotiating for classroom supplies, the priorities are plain. When tens of millions flow to Senate and House campaign committees instead of teacher pension advocacy, the mission statement writes itself.

Meanwhile, the internal fractures within the Democratic coalition keep widening. Not a single Pennsylvania House Democrat will back John Fetterman for re-election, a sign that the party's various factions are pulling in different directions, even as the union money keeps flowing to hold the progressive flank together.

What the unions have not said

Fox News Digital reported reaching out to both the NEA and the AFT for comment. The article did not include any response from either union. That silence is notable. When an organization is accused of diverting a billion dollars in member dues toward a political agenda disconnected from its stated mission, the public has a right to hear a defense, or at least an explanation.

NEA President Becky Pringle was photographed speaking at a rally outside the U.S. Capitol on February 12, 2025, defending public education ahead of Secretary of Education nominee Linda McMahon's confirmation hearing. AFT President Randi Weingarten appeared alongside her. Both leaders have been vocal about protecting public schools. Neither, apparently, has been eager to explain where a billion dollars in political spending fits into that mission.

The open questions remain significant. How much did the NEA spend versus the AFT? Which state affiliates were the heaviest political spenders? How many individual teachers were consulted, or even informed, before their dues funded ballot campaigns against school choice or donations to Planned Parenthood? The Defending Education investigation provides a foundation, but the full picture demands the kind of transparency Neily called for.

The Democratic Party's internal struggles over strategy and identity have been on full display in recent months. Even Jen Psaki has told fellow Democrats to stop wasting time on political dead ends. But the union money machine keeps humming, indifferent to whether the strategy is working or whether the teachers footing the bill agree with any of it.

The real cost

The billion-dollar figure is staggering on its own. But the real cost is measured in trust. Parents send their children to public schools believing the institutions governing those schools care about education. Teachers pay union dues believing those dues will be spent fighting for their livelihoods. The Defending Education reports suggest both groups have been misled, systematically, over many years, to the tune of ten figures.

A union that spends more on the Senate Majority PAC than on teacher working conditions is not a union. It is a political operation wearing a union's name. And the people paying for it, teachers, parents, taxpayers, deserve to know exactly where every dollar went.

When an institution asks for your trust and your money, then spends both on someone else's agenda, the word for that is not advocacy. It is betrayal.