OPINION:
“We the people. All of us … All of us have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of justice,” National Education Association President Becky Pringle shouted Monday at a protest of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Los Angeles as riots engulfed the nation’s second-largest city, with curfews in effect and vandals looting family-owned businesses and setting fire to the American flag.
Not to be outdone, Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, blasted President Trump’s deployment of troops to L.A. to quell the violence. She has worked all week to mobilize activists to protest Mr. Trump’s Saturday celebration of the U.S. Army.
Ms. Weingarten is working hand in glove with Indivisible, a George Soros-funded group, to encourage a “nationwide day of defiance,” organizing more than 1,000 protests nationwide. She is motivating teachers to “rise up” and stand “in solidarity” with L.A. in rebuking Mr. Trump’s presidency, especially his mass deportation efforts of illegal criminals.
Why are the two largest teachers unions so invested in defending illegal immigration? Money, of course.
One-fourth of the nearly 30,000 immigrant students at the Los Angeles Unified School District are illegal, according to United Teachers Los Angeles. In California, as in most other states, public school funding is tied directly to enrollment numbers.
Enrollment in public schools is falling, a trend concerning educators nationwide.
The most recent data shows K-12 public school enrollment has fallen to 87% in 2022 from 90.7% in 2012.
Many factors have contributed to this decline, most notably the abysmal performance of public schools.
Data from the National Center for Education Statistics showed that at the end of the 2023-2024 school year, one-third of public school students in the U.S. were performing below grade level despite nearly $20,000 in government spending per student per year.
Instead of focusing on improving results, Ms. Pringle and Ms. Weingarten, who each make $500,000 a year, are invested in bolstering public school enrollment numbers with the children of illegal immigrants.
About 7% of all public school students are from illegal immigrant households, the Center for Immigration Studies estimates, and that number is increasing every year. Official numbers are hard to come by because the teachers unions have encouraged public schools not to document the immigration status of their students.
Under the unions’ guidance, hundreds of school districts have adopted “safe zone” policies. They don’t collect data on students’ places of birth, and staff commit “to keep our students safe, especially if, and when, Trump sends ICE into our communities.”
Earlier this year, the NEA held webinars instructing teachers how to protect “undocumented” students from immigration authorities. The American Federation of Teachers has held multiple town halls educating teachers on how they can combat “escalating immigration enforcement.”
The children of illegal immigrants help public school enrollment numbers, and schools often receive additional funding to support English as a second language programs. Last year, the U.S. Department of Education distributed about $890 million in Title III grants to states for supplemental services geared toward English learners.
English-learning students tend to lower a public school’s overall performance. They have lower graduation rates and mean achievement scores in reading and mathematics compared with their native English-speaking peers, requiring more time and resources that could be devoted to native-born students.
K-12 education of the children of illegal immigrants costs U.S. taxpayers an estimated $70 billion annually.
This money inevitably finds its way into teachers union coffers and is donated to Democratic politicians to preserve the status quo of open borders.
No wonder Ms. Pringle and Ms. Weingarten have invested ample time and resources in “resisting” Mr. Trump. The president’s “America First” policies have exposed their grift, which has come at the expense of our nation’s children.
• Kelly Sadler is the commentary editor at The Washington Times.
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