Nation’s Largest Teachers’ Union ‘Stands on the Fundamental Right to Abortion’

Pro-abortion rights protesters rally outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, M
AP/Susan Walsh

The National Education Association (NEA) adopted an official position in support of a “fundamental right to abortion” during its Representative Assembly over the weekend.

New Business Item 56, adopted by NEA delegates in Houston, states:

Through existing media channels, the NEA will honor the leadership of women, non-binary, and trans people, and other survivors who have come forward to publicly name their rapists and attackers in the growing, international, #MeToo movement.

Furthermore, the NEA will include an assertion of our defense of a person’s right to control their own body, especially for women, youth, and sexually marginalized people. The NEA vigorously opposes all attacks on the right to choose and stands on the fundamental right to abortion under Roe v. Wade.

NEA takes the position to affirm abortion as a fundamental right as it accuses “misogynistic forces, under Trump” of wanting to “abolish the gains of the women’s right [sic] movement.”

“Women’s leadership is essential for any successful egalitarian movement and therefore must be protected,” NEA states.

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List (SBA List), noted that NEA has denied taking a pro-abortion position for more than 30 years.

In its booklet titled The Truth About NEA, formerly known as Deceptions by the Radical Right Against the National Education Association, the union asserted, most recently in 2005, that it is a “deception” that NEA supports abortion.

The “truth,” stated NEA, is that the organization “supports reproductive freedom without government intervention.”

The union continued:

NEA does not have a pro-abortion policy. Period. Yet its stance on this issue is often misinterpreted and misunderstood. NEA’s policy statement reads: “The National Education Association supports family planning, including the right to reproductive freedom.”

What this means is that NEA supports the current protections guaranteed under the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision. This decision allows women to decide for themselves if they should have children – or not have children – and protects the constitutional rights of all women, whether they are pro-choice or anti-abortion.

“This vote removes all doubt about where they stand,” Dannenfelser said in a statement. “It is appalling and flies in the face of logic that America’s largest educators’ union, claiming to speak for more than three million members nationwide, would side with the extreme abortion lobby in embracing an explicitly anti-child and anti-family stance.”

The pro-life leader added that while NEA also presents itself as non-partisan, “the Assembly went on record attacking President Trump and his pro-life agenda.”

“We encourage pro-life teachers and parents to stand up and voice their opposition loudly and clearly to union leadership,” she said.

Judie Brown, president of American Life League, also observed to Breitbart News in a statement that NEA “has had a long history of undermining fundamental truths such as the right to life.”
Brown continued:
The NEA’s latest public stand in favor of abortion on demand, calling this act of killing a “fundamental right,” is just the most recent assault on the values that this nation once held dear. While our students continue to slide downward academically, they are being bombarded with politically-correct nonsense like this wholesale assault on human dignity, not to mention sex education and other matters that do not belong in the classroom.  America’s students deserve better than what the NEA is serving up!  Let’s make sure they hear about.  We are disgusted with their fall into the hellish pit of the culture of death.

Texas-based education analyst Donna Garner told Breitbart News in a statement that she is “appalled” to learn NEA declare abortion to be a “fundamental right.”

“Since when is it a ‘fundamental right’ to kill an unborn baby who is made in the image of God?” asked Garner, a classroom teacher for more than 33 years.

“I am ashamed that educators who above all are supposed to nurture children would have the audacity to cast a vote to destroy life,” she added. “With so many parents yearning to adopt, it is unthinkable that the NEA would take the position of depriving these parents of living out their dream.”

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