Contact: Marsha Richards, Communications Director
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NEA doesn’t show up in court; union fined $800,000 for “intentional” violations of state law

OLYMPIA, WA - A Thurston County Superior Court judge today fined the National Education Association (NEA) $800,000 plus legal fees for “intentional” violations of a Washington state law that prohibits the unauthorized use of agency fees* for political activity. The court also issued a permanent injunction barring the union from collecting agency fees from thousands of Washington state teachers.

The default judgment comes after the NEA missed a court deadline last week to respond to a lawsuit brought by the Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF), an Olympia-based policy research organization. EFF filed the lawsuit after staff of Washington’s Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) found the union guilty of violating state law, but expressed reluctance to prosecute.

Although the NEA testified before both the Washington PDC and the United States Congress regarding the lawsuit, union attorneys failed to file a timely response or notify the court of a planned appearance.

“We are astounded that the NEA missed or ignored this deadline,” said Bob Williams, EFF’s president. “Apparently NEA officials think complying with state laws isn’t a high enough priority to merit close attention, but we expect this judgment to remind them that we value teachers’ rights here in Washington.”

EFF believes the NEA will make an excuse for missing the deadline and ask the court to vacate the judgment in the next few weeks.

Blue Cross and all school districts in Washington state have been notified that they must stop collecting the union’s agency fees from thousands of Washington teachers.

The NEA’s state affiliate, the Washington Education Association, was penalized more than $770,000 last year for breaking the same state law. The NEA’s fine bumps two earlier WEA fines to become the largest in Washington state history.

* Teachers who give up their union membership, often for political and ideological reasons, become “agency fee payers.” Washington state law strictly prohibits the use of any agency fees for political activity without first obtaining permission from each individual fee-payer.

Bob Williams’s written Congressional testimony regarding NEA's illegal and illegitimate politics

Evergreen Freedom Foundation P.O. Box 552, Olympia, WA 98507 Phone: (360) 956-3482, Fax: (360) 352-1874 Email: effwa@effwa.org