CDC buckles to teacher union threats: Announces stricter school-masking guidelines

Caroline Downey
National Review
Wed, 08 Sep 2021 18:33 UTC

© Marco Bello/Reuters

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The CDC adopted stricter mask guidance for public schools after a major teachers' union pressured the agency with a reproving statement.

Email correspondence obtained by Fox News between officials from the National Education Association, the nation's second largest teachers' union, and the White House reveal collaboration to push the CDC to release more rigorous mask recommendations.

One such email includes a NEA draft statement criticizing the CDC for neglecting to address school safety in its May 13 public health guidance, which relaxed mask-wearing requirements indoors and outside for fully vaccinated Americans.

On May 14, a day after the CDC's updated guidance went live, White House director of labor engagement Erika Dinkel-Smith said she convinced the NEA to put a pause on publishing its critical statement. The statement ultimately released by the NEA was significantly gentler in its criticisms of the CDC, which eventually clarified that everyone should be wearing masks in schools regardless of vaccination status.

"We appreciate the developing nature of the science and its implications for guidance, but releasing the guidance without accompanying school-related updates creates confusion and fuels the internal politicization of this basic health and safety issue," the NEA draft statement read. "CDC has consistently said, and studies support, that mitigation measures, including to protect the most vulnerable, remain necessary in schools and institutions of higher education - particularly because no elementary or middle school students, and few high school students, have been vaccinated."

"This will also make it hard for school boards and leaders of institutions of higher education to do the right thing by maintaining mitigation measures," it continued. "We need CDC clarification right away."

Other emails obtained by Fox News indicate there was subsequent communication between Dinkel-Smith, CDC chief of staff Sherri Berger, NEA President Becky Pringle, and Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers on May 14. In these conversations, the leaders presumably discussed tightening mask guidance for public schools per the teachers' union insistence.

A day later on May 15, the CDC updated its masking recommendation to urge all school students, faculty, and staff to resume mask-wearing regardless of vaccination status.

The emails, released via a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Americans for Public Trust, come after the New York Post revealed in May that the American Federation of Teachers influenced the CDC February guidelines on reopening schools

Caroline Downey is a news writer for National Review Online. Follow her on Twitter: @carolinedowney

Comment: Apparently the pressure campaign began last May, with the Biden admin. More from the Fox News report:

The Biden administration tightened its masking guidance after a prominent teachers union threatened White House officials with publicly releasing harsh criticism, internal emails show.

The National Education Association sent a draft statement to White House officials that included harsh criticism of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's masking guidance, the emails show. But the teachers union ultimately published a version with a much softer tone, and the CDC clarified its guidance to indicate that everyone should be masked in schools, regardless of vaccination status.

The new emails show further coordination between the White House and teachers unions just months after reports highlighted the extent the unions had influenced the administration's messaging on school reopenings. The watchdog group Americans for Public Trust obtained the emails through a Freedom of Information Act request and provided them to Fox News.

[...]

The emails also show the White House and the CDC had extensive contact with union leadership.

On May 14, Dinkel-Smith asked CDC chief of staff Sherri Berger to connect NEA President Becky Pringle with the CDC director. Berger responded to the request by writing "will do" and that the CDC director was "connecting w/ Becky now."

Less than 30 minutes later, Berger sent an update saying she had spoken with Pringle and Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

The next day, on May 15, the CDC updated its masking guidance to indicate that all people should wear a mask at school regardless of vaccination status.

"This batch of emails came just weeks after we already exposed the teachers unions influenced the CDC on school openings," Americans for Public Trust Executive Director Caitlin Sutherland told Fox News. "Lo and behold, less than two weeks later, they're at it again, but this time in relation to mask guidance."

Apparently the group that is supposedly most concerned with children's welfare, doesn't really care after all.

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