Randi Weingarten is a 30-year union executive who, aside from a brief one-semester stint as a full-time teacher, 4
Weingarten earns an annual salary and expenses of roughly $500,000 from teachers’ union dues and mandatory agency fees while overseeing a union budget that spends over $1.6 million on luxury hotels, travel, and cars for union executives.31 Under Weingarten’s watch, the union “spent more than $1.3 million on luxury hotels, more than $300,000 on foreign travel and an eye-popping $59,368 on car services between 2011 and 2014.”39
Moe pointed out that despite her public assertions in support of education reforms, Weingarten’s support for Hillary Clinton in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary over the more pro-reform candidate Barack Obama showed that Weingarten actually opposed teacher accountability reforms.39
Moe concluded by arguing that while Weingarten outwardly positions herself as pro-education reform, “when the details are actually hashed out, she will only go as far as she has to-and she will ultimately weaken, limit, and dissipate reform” when it benefits the interests of her unionized teachers.39
In 2011, the Wall Street Journal noted Weingarten’s hypocrisy on a variety of teacher reforms saying, “Ms. Weingarten insists that teachers unions are agents of change, not defenders of the status quo. But in the next breath she shoots down suggestions for changes—vouchers, charter schools, differential teacher pay and so on—that have become important parts of the reform conversation.”39
Similarly in 2007, then-New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (I) labeled Weingarten’s United Federation of Teachers the “number one” impediment toward education reform. It was reported that Weingarten, during the negotiations over the Mayor’s education reform plan, called city Department of Education officials “absolute and complete a[**]holes.”41
Protecting Bad Teachers
Weingarten has claimed that the unions she has led favor teacher accountability. In 2004, she wrote, “This is a union that is not about just keeping people. We are about keeping qualified people.”39 New York Sun commentator Andrew Wolf, labeled New York’s 2007 differentiated pay agreement “socialism for schools” that skewed power to each school and increased the power of the union.39
In 2007 then-Gov. Elliot Spitzer (D-N.Y.) proposed a $7 billion education funding increase along with a host of other items on the teacher- union wish list, like full-day kindergarten and universal pre-K. Weingarten opposed Spitzer’s plan, reportedly since it called for increasing the cap on the number of charter schools and for providing a tax break for parents who sent their children to charter schools.39 even though most charter-school teachers have opted not to be represented by her union or her sister unions.4 It was also reported she had “fundamental disagreements” with Ken Martin, who was elected to being DNC chair in February 2025, as she had supported Wisconsin Democratic Party chair Ben Wikler’s campaign for DNC president instead. According to Politico, Weingarten was removed from her position on the DNC “Ways and Bylaws” committee following Martin’s appointment. 4
Lobbying
Randi Weingarten was a registered lobbyist for the United Federation of Teachers in New York City from 2007-2009. 0){
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