The United Federation of Teachers went all in for New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani last July. Hundreds of members in red UFT shirts canvassed Queens and Brooklyn in the heat, believing they’d elected their ideal mayor.
He called himself a democratic socialist, opposed “top-down control,” vowed to end mayoral control of schools, and promised to pass the union’s prized RESPECT bill for paraprofessionals.
“Never before have we had a mayor who is a stronger champion of workers,” declared the UFT.
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Three months later, the honeymoon was already in ruins.
On Dec. 31, 2025, just hours before he would be sworn in, Mamdani quietly asked Albany to extend mayoral control of the schools for another four years.
He reversed himself on the very reform he had campaigned on, dismantling it.
Liberal educators called it a “breach of trust” and a “mishap.” The UFT, which had made ending mayoral control a top priority, was left holding the bag after mobilizing for him.
Then came the February blizzard.
Roughly 15% of teachers called out. The United Federation of Teachers President, Michael Mulgrew, responded: “We don’t agree with the decision, but they have a right to make that decision.”
Some teachers criticized the mayor and union leadership, expressing disappointment at the decision to prioritize normal operations and frustration with the union response.
Even the most left-wing mayor in NYC history may sometimes face challenges balancing different stakeholders’ needs when running the nation’s largest school system.
Then in March, the mayor was at odds with the union again.
The UFT’s flagship legislative proposal, the RESPECT bill, would provide approximately 26,000 paraprofessionals with a $10,000 annual bonus in addition to their salary, thereby bypassing normal contract negotiations.
Mamdani had publicly supported it as a candidate. In March, his administration opposed the bill in City Council testimony, arguing it violates the Taylor Law and creates “significant legal, practical and fairness concerns” by short-circuiting collective bargaining.
To translate that into casual language, even a socialist mayor wouldn’t let the union write its own paycheck in the City Council chamber.
The Taylor Law exists for a reason, as it forces negotiation instead of unilateral giveaways that would destroy the Education Department budget and set a precedent every other municipal union would immediately demand.
The lesson to be learned here is simple: Even our most left-leaning politicians cannot satisfy the public teachers unions’ ridiculous demands.
When a true believer is forced to cite state labor law and basic governance realities, it exposes how far the unions have drifted from the actual job of educating children and how much the rest of us are expected to put up with it.
Mulgrew has already threatened to try to kill the entire state budget unless it includes revisions to the Tier VI pension rules enacted in 2012, demanding a rollback that would allow teachers to retire earlier without massive penalties.
He declared, “If we don’t have the significant fixes in Tier VI, then vote the budget down.”
The changes would cost local governments, including New York City, hundreds of millions of dollars a year in higher pension contributions.
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It seems evident that no matter how much these teachers unions get, it won’t be enough. Nothing ever is.
Mamdani is learning this the hard way, and one can only hope that other government officials will soon become wary of these teachers unions before the ridiculous demands for ridiculous bills land squarely on the backs of New York City taxpayers.
Aaron Withe is the Chief Executive Officer of the Freedom Foundation.