Mamdani Locked in Legal Battle With NYC Teacher Union That Endorsed Him
“We knew this lawsuit was a possibility, and we were prepared”
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is now caught in a legal battle with the United Federation of Teachers (UFT), the city’s largest teacher union, which endorsed his candidacy for mayor.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that this fight is about money and control.
FOX News has details:
Mamdani turns on New York City teachers union with lawsuit blocking pay raises for educators
The United Federation of Teachers (UFT), New York City’s largest teachers union, is fighting back against Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s efforts to block a city-backed pay raise for education paraprofessionals, after the group previously endorsed him last year.
Last month, the New York City Council unanimously passed the “RESPECT Check Act,” which would offer up to a $10,000-bonus for education paraprofessionals.
Though Mamdani supported a version of the bill in the past, he has since spoken out against it, arguing that it violates New York state’s Taylor Law, which protects public employees’ rights to negotiate issues like compensation. His administration later filed a lawsuit to stop the law from being enacted Aug. 19.
In response, the UFT filed a motion to intervene last week, preparing to take the issue to court if Mamdani continues to fight the measure.
“We knew this lawsuit was a possibility, and we were prepared,” UFT President Michael Mulgrew told Fox News Digital in a statement. “The RESPECT check law, which was unanimously passed by City Council on July 16, was carefully drafted to make sure that it did not violate the state’s Taylor Law, which governs collective bargaining.”
Mamdani’s objection to this seems confusing at first. The raise seems like just the sort of thing he would support.
This report from the New York Post puts it all into perspective. (Emphasis is mine):
Mamdani — who was endorsed in his election run last year by the UFT — claims the way the extra cash for the low-paid education workers was approved by city lawmakers violates state labor law covering contract negotiations with public employee unions.
But lifting the low pay of paras who aid students with disabilities has been a top priority of UFT president Mike Mulgrew, who represents them.
“As the representative of the paraprofessionals, the UFT should be permitted to defend the interests of its members in this important legal proceeding,” the August 25. filing by UFT lawyer Charles Moerdler said.
Starting pay for paras is $33,000 and reaches $56,000 after 15 years.
The pay bump for 10,000 paras would cost the city $324 million.
Mamdani maintains he supports a salary bump for paras or teachers’ aides, but it should be done via collective bargaining or contract talks between his office and the UFT— not dictated by the Council.
The RESPECT Check Act, which passed the Council unanimously, became law without the mayor’s signature.
So the union had the audacity to go around the mayor and negotiate this directly with the city council instead of him.
How dare they?
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Comments
It’s a shame they both can’t lose.
Being a student in the NYC public school system must be just this side of being in the pages of the Gulag Archipelago.
Eventually the failure of public schools to teach even the most basic things – reading, writing, civics – is going to create a underclass so enormous that it will collapse the system.
Just as Professors Cloward & Piven sought.
And not ironically, both were professors in NYC.
Its a pity neither is alive to suffer the results. Then again they probably would have escaped to Florida knowing what was coming.
“Eventually the failure of public schools to teach even the most basic things”
You say eventually, I remember reading “Up The Down Staircase” in grammar school.
Keeping Mamdani and his policies tied up in court on this and other matters would be a very good thing.
What are they complaining about? Obviously, the union thought the idea – of having a muslim communist determine what everyone’s fair share would be – was a good one.
Yeah. It’s not like they didn’t notice the liar with his pants on fire.
Hell hath no fury like a proggie whose sky does not disgorge its pie.
If the UFT wants to unilaterally abandon their collective bargaining control over the salaries of the teachers, aides and whomever else pays dues …so that each individual may negotiate their salary/benefits without UFT interference …sure. The UFT and their advocates on the council can’t have it both ways so that UFT retains control of bargaining but can sidestep the collective bargaining system whenever it feels like it would be better for one or more subcategories of its membership.
This is really more about Mamdani’s ego and control over the negotiation process and maintaining Mayor’s office control/influence of the purse strings and trade-off to finance the 10K per person pay out. Cutting out the Mayor’s office was a mistake b/c each Mayor wants to dip their fingers into the pie and dispense/withhold patronage.
It’s great to see the communists fighting amongst themselves.
Hope it achieves Bolsheviks vs. Mensheviks levels of violence where filthy leftists eliminate each other.
i just made some hot parmigiana covered pop corn.. gonna sit back n watch the fun,
The pay bump woukd be $324m? Methinks Mamdani is starting to learn that Math is ruthless, doesn’t care about ideology, and it always wins in the end.
What happened to “the warmth of collectivism”? Why aren’t the UFTers satisfied with that? That’s what he was peddling when he ran. They knew what he said everyone was going to be getting. Did something go wrong? Whatever could it be?
When two jackals are at each other’s throats, pop some corn.
muslims are permitted to lie to non-muslims. Everything they say is a lie.
Unfortunately, most people don’t believe that or understand that. Yes, Muslims lie routinely to non-muslims, and I think that it is disgusting!
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