Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. Teachers are on the front lines of democracy. That's the argument made by Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, former president of the local New York City chapter, in her new book, Why Fascists Fear Teachers: Public Education and the Future of Democracy. In it, she traces a long history of authoritarian leaders: Hitler, Mussolini, Putin, and she cites right-wing activists here in the United States seeking to control or discredit teachers. Why? Because she says education cultivates the habits of democracy, critical thinking, pluralism, opportunity, and collective action. We'll talk with Randi Weingarten about why she believes public schools are democracy's engine and what she thinks today's attacks on teachers reveal about the political moment we're in and what she thinks anyone should do about it. We'll also get into some issues in the news, like why she recently quit the Democratic National Committee. Randi Weingarten, welcome back to WNYC.

Randi Weingarten: Oh, Brian, it is my honor. Every time I talk to you, I feel the connection to New York City. Thank you for having me on.

Brian Lehrer: That's very nice. Thank you very much. Listeners, we love to hear from you. Did a teacher in your life help you think more critically or help you see your role as a citizen differently? How has your experience with public education shaped the way you view democracy? President Trump and his allies argue schools don't always open students' minds but sometimes indoctrinate them from the left. You can say that too. 212-433-WNYC. 212-433-9692. Call or text. Randi, the book is on the bestseller list, I see.

Number 10 for nonfiction per The New York Times. Congratulations.

Randi Weingarten: Thank you.

Brian Lehrer: I have to ask if you regret the title in light of calls to turn down the temperature after the assassination of Charlie Kirk, with the words, "Hey, fascist, catch," found on bullet casings.

Randi Weingarten: Look, I very much regret and have stood up against political violence wherever it is from. When Mr. Kirk was assassinated, I was out there condemning it in the strongest terms, asking my members all across the country to do whatever they can to de-escalate. I do not regret the title of a book that is both a warning and a sign of hope about what to do.

What I saw, Brian, in the last election and look, I'm a social studies teacher and I've complained mightily for a long time that the testing and the high stakes testing that we've done for years in America's public schools, have stymied us from doing the work we need to do for people to really, truly understand civics and understand the differing governments that have existed in the world, not just in the United States. I'm critical of myself as well. What I saw in the last election, which is when I was writing this book, is that people do not know what fascism is.

They don't know what authoritarianism is. We may know from our own history that the founders did the work they did in the Constitution, the separation of powers, both state and federal, and the three branches, to try to stop us from ever having another king or another monarch. I saw in General Kelly's comments when he talked about fascistic behaviors, people saw it as political. They didn't see it as the warning. My title here is about a warning. I do not call anyone a fascist per se. I talk about what fascistic behaviors are.

I think it's really important that people see it and understand it.

Brian Lehrer: On people not knowing what fascism is, I guess critics of using that word in the title of your book, and I realize, of course, it was titled and the books were out before the assassination of Charlie Kirk, but fascism was a specific government system in a specific time and place. The New York Post is criticizing you for the word, quoting the book, when you say you don't call anyone a fascist, they quote the book, "Democracy is people power, but fascists want one leader or a small group of elites to have all the power, and that's what's happening in the United States with billionaire Trump having enabled his shadow governing partner, Elon Musk, the wealthiest person in the world, to act as his co president." One might ask, that might be oligarchy, but is fascist more inflammatory and historically overreaching than is good for the country?

Randi Weingarten: I think that we need to-- Let me just say this. Just this week, social media posts came out that called for my execution. I do not see the right wing running to denounce a person who is about to be confirmed for one of the highest positions in the State Department when someone like that is calling for my execution. Let's separate out the political arguments from what I was trying to do here. The point in terms of, and I use the terms oligarchy, authoritarianism, and fascism not interchangeably, but I do use them in different kinds of ways.

What fascism is is not simply the consolidation of power by oligarchs or by billionaires, which is what is happening in this country right now. You don't have to even think about Elon Musk. Just look at the big ugly bill, which, sorry, my term for it, that essentially transferred-- It's the biggest transfer of wealth from working folks to billionaires that we've ever had in this country. A bigger transfer of wealth than in the Gilded Age. Oligarchical issues are part of it, meaning the concentration of wealth, the income inequality, which frankly, I think is one of the reasons, ironically, that people voted for Donald Trump.

Why same people voted for Donald Trump, AOC, and maybe in the primary, Zohran Mamdani, because they want people to deal with affordability. The issue about fascist governments is the difference-- The most important point I can make, and Jason Stanley makes this point and Tim Snyder makes this point and Ruth Ben-Ghiat makes this point, the historians make this point all the time, is that it takes this notion of loving the past and makes the past into something that is beloved and says that the present, what is going on in the present is so bad and so dark and the others are challenging our life so much.

The others could be immigrants, they could be Jews, they could be people of color, but the others are challenging our life so much that the others need to be not only denigrated, but dehumanized. I use as an example, for example, what happened to Austrian Jews during the Nazi regime. Initially, Jews were not sent to the camps. Initially, they were told and instructed to actually get on their knees and wash the streets in their Sunday or Saturday best, to dehumanize people. All of this is on a spectrum, and people have to understand the behaviors.

Actually, as a teacher, you cannot actually understand what to do about something if you don't understand the behaviors or you don't understand what it means. All you see is a very, very scary word. That's what I tried to do.

Brian Lehrer: On some of the history, in the introduction to the book, you tell the story, for example, of Norwegian teachers and-

Randi Weingarten: Correct.

Brian Lehrer: -relating it back to education. Resisting Nazi occupation by wearing paper clips and continuing to teach in secret schools despite arrests and beatings. What does that story tell about the power of teachers that you think still resonates today, or reasons why they may have been targeted in the past under actual fascist regimes?

Randi Weingarten: Some of the historians and sociologists I quote talk about how authoritarians are very, very, very concerned with people knowing critical thinking or people thinking for themselves. Remember what Putin said? Putin said wars are won by teachers. What we are supposed to be doing is we have to teach kids how to think. Not what to think, but how to think. You know this about me quite well, and I know this about you and others in New York quite well. We all have our opinions. You might have 7 million people who live in New York. You'll have 8 million opinions.

Many of us are not shy about expressing them. That is really different than actually understanding fact from fiction and being able to discern fact from fiction. Part of what critical thinking is, and part of what teachers do, is that. The other point I was trying to make in the story about the Norwegian teachers and the paperclip is that it's not just about education. It's about community and what schools do. Schools, whether it's in New York City, whether it's a neighborhood school, or whether it's a school anywhere in the country, schools become centers of community.

They become places where people who are different get to understand each other, get to see each other, not just get to tolerate each other, but actually start understanding differences and seeing differences. That's what schools do, and school teachers try to create a welcome and safe environment for each and every one of our kids. Look, we're in locus parentis during the school day. It is part of the reason that many of us around the country are fighting to protect our immigrant kids, because we don't want our kids being taken from us in the middle of the day by a guy with a mask.

You see in the LA corridor programs of parents and teachers walking kids to school, you see so many places where we are saying, and frankly, we sued on this saying to Donald Trump, I wrote him the first day of his administration, asking him, begging him, do not lift the sensitive locations memo that basically said ICE can't go into churches or synagogues or mosques or schools or hospitals, but that's who teachers are. It is both about the pluralism, about creating a safe and welcoming environment, and then it's about the education.

The most important aspect of education these days is we have to actually engage kids, and we have to find ways that they learn to ask questions, to problem solve, to critically think. We are competing with social media every single day. Critical thinking, which was really, really important to the founders, is really, really important today.

Brian Lehrer: Randi Weingarten, our guest, president of the American Federation of Teachers, author now of Why Fascists Fear Teachers: Public Education and the Future of Democracy. John in Queens, you're on WNYC. A retired teacher, I see, social studies. John, you're on WNYC with Randi Weingarten.

John: Hey, good morning, Brian. Good morning, Randi.

Randi Weingarten: Good morning, John.

John: We've met several times. I am retired social studies teacher. I'm out here in Queens in an area that is the most diverse area according to the census of the last census in America, and probably the world in that case. I was a social studies teacher in middle school, and in 2017, had several students who parents were going to hearings for their status, and they couldn't focus. They had to sit in the principal's office that day just because of their worry. That's sad. It's sad.

My point is that you're talking about authoritarianism and fascism, and I am of the belief that fascism should be reserved for that time and place of Italy with Mussolini. I just finished a really good book, Man of the Century, about Mussolini. It's a novel based on the real effects. It's been a worldwide bestseller. When I talk to people, adults who are not so familiar with history as maybe I am, and the fact about authoritarianism is it doesn't happen overnight. When you study Hitler and the Nazis, or Muso--

Brian Lehrer: Whoops. Did we lose you?

Randi Weingarten: We lost him. [crosstalk]

John: Mussolini came into power. Yes. My question is, how do we let people really understand that this is something that creeps up? It's like the old Hemingway quote, "Suddenly, then all at once."

Brian Lehrer: John, I'm going to leave it there. Thank you for putting those things on the table, including that specific question. Randi.

Randi Weingarten: Look, Brian, I think John answered your question about why I don't regret the title better than I did, which is that it's a warning. As I said, I saw it. I was shocked in the late stages of the 2024 election that Trump called Kamala Harris a fascist. The two generals that worked for Trump were very concerned and tried to create a warning, but people don't know what it means. Part of my job as an educator, not just as a union leader, is to actually try to teach. That's why I said very clearly in the book that I was not going to call anybody, per se, a fascist, because that was not my point.

My point is a warning. My second point, which is what John just did as well, is what do we do about these things? We can't escalate. We have to de-escalate. Part of de-escalating is what teachers do in classrooms every single day. That's why I wanted to talk about the teachers who are my heroes, who every single day are trying to create a safe and welcoming environment, are trying to ensure that our kids are engaged.

That day that John was teaching that his kids' parents were going through a process of becoming American citizens; of course, the kids are going to be worried. Kids feel everything that is going on in home or everything that's going on in society. We as teachers have to understand it and have to actually meet kids where they are.

Brian Lehrer: You point in the book to figures like Chris Rufo, the conservative activist who called for a "siege strategy against schools." You're right. Mike Pompeo, former Secretary of State in Trump 1, who labeled you the most dangerous person in the world. I don't know the context for that, but what are those kinds of attacks tell you about why public schools and public school teachers have become such prime targets?

Randi Weingarten: Let me actually go through the rest of what Mr. Rufo did, which is his point was that in order to create a universal voucher system, meaning in order to create a system where public schools are no longer the-- That there's a fragmentation of schooling all throughout the country, that you have to create universal public school distrust. The point that they're trying to make is that they don't want public schooling. Frankly, we have seen that since Brown v. Board of Education.

There's always been a pushback to trying to create a system that is about opportunity for all. Whether it is fighting about the money or whether it is fighting about like what's going on right now, where Trump is withholding money from New York City because they don't want kids who are LGBTQ to use bathrooms in a certain way. What you see here is the use of public schooling as a culture war, and as opposed to off limits. I think it should be off limits. I think our politics should be outside of schools, not inside schools.

I think what we should be doing in schools is really trying to help all kids see the possibilities of their future, imagine the possibilities of their future. Part of that means that we get into questions, particularly in history, that are critical of the country, but show the struggle of what the country has done. I think that's the power of our country, not the problem of our country.

Brian Lehrer: On leaving politics at the classroom door, as I think you were just suggesting, I think, Tom, a New York City public school teacher, is going to push back a little bit. Tom, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Tom: Good morning, Brian. Good morning, Ms. Weingarten. Yes, I'm a active New York City public school teacher. Randi, I have to tell you there are many of us who are angry at how politicized the UFT has become. Many of us have withdrawn or reduced our COPE contributions. Other than that, just a quick question about the new health care--

Randi Weingarten: Tom, you have a right.

Tom: Yes, go ahead.

Randi Weingarten: Let me just say there is a difference between what we teach-- Look, there's a difference between K12 and higher education. There's a difference between what we teach in classrooms. This is why I constantly say our job and it's hard, but our job is helping kids learn how to think, not what to think. There is a value system that we believe in in terms of treating people humanely. Liberty, justice, opportunity. I'm not suggesting that we shouldn't do that. The issue about the union, the union can be as political as it was, as long as it's democratic.

You have a right to pull back on your COPE contributions if you don't like the direction of the union. You have a right to vote for different leadership if you don't like the direction of the union. The union meets every month, as you and I both know, in these multiple-hundred-person delegate assemblies, but that's different than schooling.

Tom: My question, Randi, is why can't, and by the way, COPE, for those of you who don't know what COPE is, COPE are paycheck deductions that goes towards the union that they're allowed to use to--

Randi Weingarten: It's voluntary, Tom--

Tom: Right.

Brian Lehrer: For politics and its voluntary. Tom, thank you for doing --

[crosstalk]

Randi Weingarten: It's voluntary contribution that teachers may elect to do that goes for political work.

Brian Lehrer: Tom, thank you for doing my job in translating the acronym. You had a follow-up question?

Tom: Yes, Randi. I have not withdrawn my COPE. I have lowered my COPE deduction. I have not withdrawn. Many have withdrawn it due to the Mamdani endorsement. My question is, why can't members see the new health care proposal contract? We are getting--

Brian Lehrer: Tom, I'm going to cut you off here because I don't want to go down the rabbit hole of a local contract provision about health care. We're talking about national issues with Randi Weingarten. In the context of her as a national, national political leader concerned about democracy. Forgive me, we've done and will do more segments on the health care and pushing retirees from the UFT into Medicare Advantage, and all of that. I appreciate the big issues that you raised, and I'm going to ask a follow-up question on that, actually. Randi, and to your answer before, what about the critique from the right that many public school curriculum materials and teaching approaches have become, what they would call too woke, telling students what to think from that point of view? When you say they shouldn't be told what to think, they should be taught how to think, do you accept it at all? Does the union defend teachers' rights to teach from a more conservative perspective, too, when they feel that they're not allowed to do that?

Randi Weingarten: Yes. I don't want to say and but. I think what has happened, Brian, is that there are lots of issues around current events and how to teach about current events. I think that there's part of the reason, and New York City is different than so many other school systems around the country, which are really lay led by a elected school board. The curriculum in terms of New York City is set by the state and set to some extent by the city. The issues become, really, how do you deal with current events? How do you deal with Howard Beach from years and years ago, where two kids were fatally hurt--

Brian Lehrer: Yusuf Hawkins, I think the name was a Black kid in a neighborhood where he "didn't belong." Right?

Randi Weingarten: Right. Then they were fatally hurt in that moment. Then what happened afterwards in New York City when Rodney King was fatally hurt in LA, when George Floyd was-- [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: [unintelligible 00:25:10], but he was beaten. Go ahead.

Randi Weingarten: He was beaten. You're right. Sorry, my bad. Sorry. When people all across America saw the brutal assassination of Charlie Kirk, the real issue becomes for all of us, how do you deal with and these events, and how do you help create an understanding when there is such a rife political divisiveness about all of it? Teachers have to figure that out on a day-to-day basis. Part of it is sometimes we get guidance K12 from a school system, saying this is how you should deal with an event, this is what you should do.

Many times we don't. What ends up happening is you look at it through the lens of your own experience. What teachers should be doing, and many of them in New York City do, and many of them around the country do, is you try to teach from a lot of different perspectives. You try to do a debate from different perspectives if you're in social studies. One of my favorite debates when I taught at Clara Barton High School, and look, personally, I do not think we should have bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In retrospect, I think it's wrong.

I would create a debate in my AP social studies class about that and have people look at it from different vantage points, points, and different views about it. That's what teaching is about. Do we get it wrong sometimes? Yes, sometimes we get it wrong. What happens in this environment today is getting it wrong then immediately means you want to hurt your enemies.

Look at what Donald Trump said at Kirk's funeral after Kirk's wife said, "I forgive his killer." Donald Trump said, "Well, I am not so, so forgiving. I hate my opponents." We have to find ways we create a civil discourse, not create something where one hates someone who has a differing viewpoint than them.

Brian Lehrer: Let me ask you one political thing that pertains to you that's in the news. I see that you really resigned your post with the Democratic National Committee of the Democratic Party, of course, in June. You questioned why the new DNC chair, Ken Martin, was "not enlarging our tent and actively trying to engage more and more of our communities." What is Ken Martin not doing more specifically that you would want to see the Democratic Party do?

Randi Weingarten: I did a very long interview about this in The New York Review of Books. Let me just do the contrast between what Mamdani is doing in terms of affordability and what I think the DNC didn't do since January. I think the election was very much about which most elections are. Am I better off today than I was a few years ago? Is my family going to have a future? Do I see a better life for myself and my family? Workers in America don't see it.

That's part of the reason why you see nationally and federally this huge-- Literally, almost every election, you've seen a change in party leadership. You've seen a change from differing parties in the presidency, in the control of Congress. You see these huge swings because people are really dissatisfied in the last polling in the last few days. Right track, wrong track. I think it's right track 25%, wrong track 75%. You see this deep division even on things that we should be together on, like the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

You see huge divisions on political violence. We all should have been condemning political violence and de-escalating. I think what happened is the DNC, I think, should be out there far more, not just making the contrast in terms of what Donald Trump is or isn't doing, but what do we need to do to help working people have the promise of America? How do we do that? It shouldn't simply be whatever the leadership in the Congress is saying. As much as I love the leadership, I'm very close to Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries. The Democratic Party has to have a brand about what it's going to do for working people.

Brian Lehrer: Why do you think-- [crosstalk] We have one minute.

Randi Weingarten: Once I saw that, I couldn't help it from the inside. I just wanted to do this work from the outside, and I'll always be a Democrat. I've been a Democrat forever, but I don't see the Republican Party doing any of it. I see the Republican Party basically being the party of the rich and basically wanting to suppress rights, but I want--

Brian Lehrer: One last question on that point in our last minute. Why do you think, as a stated Democrat who calls the Republican Party the party of the rich, that more working-class voters have been trending Republican in recent elections than in the past?

Randi Weingarten: I think because there's a disappointment and a sense of betrayal. You'll hear a lot of people say my parents and my grandparents, they voted for FDR. This actually gets back to even your first question about the title. We are so far away from World War II and the fight for freedom that people don't, they don't feel it, they don't see it anymore. There is a sense in this country, and I see it from statistics, I see it from what I see in the Midwest. A non-college graduate male is making 20% less today, adjusted for inflation, than he was 40 years ago.

Brian Lehrer: Thirty seconds.

Randi Weingarten: That means we're not doing what we need to do to help Americans thrive. That's what I want to fight for.

Brian Lehrer: Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, is now author of the book Why Fascists Fear Teachers: Public Education and the Future of Democracy. Thank you for joining us.

Randi Weingarten: Thank you.

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