by Spencer P. Morrison
The second largest teachers union in the U.S. may be using pensions to advance their political agenda, an education watchdog suggests.
The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) has advocated for fossil fuel divestments, pro-DEI boycotts and other pressure campaigns, Consumers’ Research told acting U.S. Secretary of Labor Keith Sonderling in a letter Thursday. The letter requests an investigation into whether AFT is influencing public pension trustees to go beyond their fiduciary duties and use their position to invest in the union’s political priorities.
Millions of educators rely on public pension fiduciaries to retire. While AFT doesn’t directly control public pension funds, over 50 AFT-affiliated trustees serve on 27 public pensions funds, according to the letter.
AFT didn’t immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
“Teachers spend their entire careers trusting that their retirement savings are being managed so they can retire without financial worries. Instead of focusing on maximizing returns, the AFT and its President Randi Weingarten have chosen to focus on woke agendas,” Consumers’ Research Executive Director Will Hild told the DCNF. “Weingarten has used her influence to push for boycotts of fossil fuel producers, firearm manufacturers, and retailers who do not conform to her woke priorities, even if these boycotts may negatively impact pensioners.
The AFT called for a Target boycott for its “rollback of commitments to diversity and investment in Black-owned businesses” in August 2025, according to a AFT resolution last March. They launched another boycott when Target’s CEO “failed to take a stand against Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s occupation of the community in which Target is headquartered” last February.
Public pension funds own almost 7 million shares in Target, Weingarten stated in an AFT press release last February.
The AFT also urged public retirement funds like the Teachers’ Retirement System of the City of New York to divest from corporations contributing to fossil fuels’ production and “reinvest them in workers and communities,” according to a 2022 resolution by AFT.
“That’s why Consumers’ Research is calling on the Department of Labor to review whether the AFT’s activist agenda is coming at the direct expense of the teachers and retirees it claims to represent,” Hild said.
Parents’ rights group the American Parents Coalition (APC) has also accused teachers unions such as AFT of influencing institutions.
“Randi Weingarten has proven over and over again her priorities are advancing a radical political agenda at the expense of children. Parents have watched Weingarten use AFT as a political machine for years, pushing activist curriculum into classrooms and keeping schools closed longer than necessary, which led to devastating learning loss,” APC Executive Director Alleigh Marré told the DCNF. “It is not surprising that Weingarten is also prioritizing this political agenda at the expense of teachers and retirees. If organizations like AFT are going to continue to claim they are advocating for education, they need be prioritizing children, parents, and teachers, not radical ideology.”
According to OpenSecrets data, teachers unions have directed at least 94 percent of their contributions to Democrats and Democratic causes since the 1990s, with the AFT and National Education Association (NEA) routinely giving 95 to nearly 100 percent of their federal political spending to the left in recent election cycles.
In the 2024 cycle, for example, the AFT funneled millions through its PAC almost exclusively to Democratic candidates and aligned groups, continuing a pattern that has seen the union and its counterpart contribute hundreds of millions in member dues and PAC funds to left-leaning entities since 2015.
Individual educators also overwhelmingly support Democrats. An analysis of hundreds of thousands of campaign contributions from K-12 teachers and professors in the 2022 cycle found that 84 percent went to Democratic candidates or committees.
– – –
Spencer P. Morrison is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation. Executive Editor of The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network Christina Botteri contributed to this report.
