Stuff in the ‘The Taxpayer-Funded Political Machine’ Category
BuryPensions goes where Jay Lassiter won’t: Look where the NJEA spends teachers’ dues.
Posted On08/14/2019 byInsiderNJ’s Jay Lassiter wrote a column this morning about the influence of special interests over New Jersey politicians. Lassiter rightly questions who these pols are working for. But he curiously failed to mention the most powerful special interest of all: the NJEA. John Bury of BuryPensions posted a piece that looks at how and where…Read More
InsiderNJ’s Lassiter decries special interest influence on politicians but leaves out the biggest one.
Posted On08/14/2019 byInsiderNJ columnist Jay Lassiter rightly calls out the influence of special interests on New Jersey politicians. He mentions New Direction New Jersey (NDNJ), the “dark money” group backing a millionaire’s tax. He also mentions Speaker Coughlin’s law firm, Assemblywoman Lampitt and others sponsoring legislation for special interests , and Senator Lagana’s ties to the insurance…Read More
Another $1 million from the NJEA deepens the governor’s conflict of interest
Posted On08/12/2019 byThe North Jersey Record reported today that the NJEA funneled another $1 million to the dark money group New Direction New Jersey (NDNJ) – this time via its Super PAC Garden State Forward. SPCNJ previously discovered that the NJEA had donated $2.5 million to NDNJ, so the NJEA has now pumped $3.5 million of its…Read More
Why is the Media Ignoring that New Direction New Jersey is an NJEA-funded vehicle?
Posted On07/10/2019 byPolitico ran a story about how Assembly Speaker Coughlin took New Direction New Jersey (NDNJ) to task for attacking Democrats. The article describes NDNJ as “a ‘dark money’ group Murphy does not control but which is run by his allies and promotes his agenda.” As SPCNJ uncovered, and as exposed in an earlier Politico story,…Read More
Whose Side Is the Governor On?
Posted On06/27/2019 byNew Jersey Globe reports that Gov. Murphy has questioned whose side Senate President Sweeney is on when it comes to the various programs and taxes wants in the state budget. But whose side is the governor on? On the side of New Jersey’s most powerful special interest and the lavishly compensated one-percenters in its leadership….Read More
What a Scam!
Posted On06/26/2019 byInsiderNJ reports on a New Direction New Jersey (NDNJ) email blast condemning the legislature’s budget as a “scam” that “screws working people” and benefits millionaires. That’s laughable. Remember that NDNJ is a dark money group funded by the NJEA with $2.5 million of taxpayer dollars. Remember that in 2016 the NJEA supported raising the gasoline…Read More
The Irony of NJEA Members Protesting Pro-Sweeney PAC
Posted On06/21/2019 byThe New Jersey Globe reports that about 50 “progressive” activists protested a fundraiser for the Sen. Sweeney-aligned General Majority PAC. The group’s statement makes it clear that they are part of the “#RedforEd” movement, which is a creation of the National Education Association, the NJEA’s parent organization. How ironic then that they call for greater…Read More
Another large public union rally at the Statehouse: who pays for it?
Posted On06/14/2019 byYou do, taxpayers. $129 million’s worth last year. Your property tax dollars pay for teacher salaries and the union’s dues are withheld from them, so your tax dollars flow through the district and the teachers directly to the NJEA. Of this generous $129 million of funding, SPCNJ estimates that $65 million is spent on politics….Read More
The NJEA Spends $13.99 million Both FOR and AGAINST Sweeney
Posted On06/10/2019 byI guess when you have hundreds of millions of forced teacher dues, derived from siphoned off property tax dollars, you can afford to throw a lot of money around. Even at cross-purposes. In Insider NJ today, Edward Edwards points out that the NJEA’s independent expenditure arm, Garden State Forward, gave a Sweeney-affiliated PAC $5.55…Read More
Sen. Sweeney is right about the appearance of an NJEA-dominated Trenton
Posted On06/10/2019 byIn an article by Dustin Racioppi and Charlie Stile in north jersey.com, Sen. Sweeney makes two good points about the current state of affairs in New Jersey. First, given that our governor appears in NJEA-funded TV ads, calling for NJEA policy priorities in the same language the NJEA uses, and that our governor then vetoed…Read More