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NEA Delegates Vote to Sever ADL Ties, Executive Committee to Decide Next Steps

It underscores union divisions over policing antisemitism during Gaza activism ahead of final executive committee approval.

National Education Association President Rebecca Pringle speaks during the Get Out the Vote Rally in Detroit in 2022. (Dominick Sokotoff/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, speaks during an immigrant rights protest outside of the Department of Justice headquarters in Washington, D.C., on June 9, 2025.
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Overview

  • On July 6, the NEA’s 7,000-member Representative Assembly approved New Business Item 39 to stop using, endorsing or publicizing any Anti-Defamation League curricular materials, statistics or programs.
  • Designated a “sanction item,” the measure was automatically referred to the NEA’s nine-member Executive Committee, which must ratify it before it takes effect.
  • Delegates accused the ADL of weaponizing antisemitism to punish Israel critics, inflating hate-crime figures and labeling pro-Palestinian organizing as hate speech.
  • The ADL condemned the vote as “profoundly disturbing” and accused the NEA of advancing an antisemitic agenda, while the Council on American-Islamic Relations praised the decision.
  • The split reflects a broader clash in progressive and labor circles over curriculum control, hate-speech definitions and the influence of emerging pro-Palestinian union caucuses.