The president of a teachers union has confirmed the union is protecting a faculty member who had sex with a student, a new undercover video by James O’Keefe’s Project Veritas shows.
“This file right here is from a teacher who had sex with a student. This file is about whether or not the teacher gets to keep his pension. Is he going to jail? No. How come? Because the child’s not pressing charges. There’s no proof.”
Those are the words of Kathleen Valencia, president of the Union City Education Association.
It was the second video released in a developing series about teachers’ unions prompted by teachers walking off the job in several states and demanding more pay.
The first featured Hamilton Township Education Association President David Perry, who admitted that to protect accused teachers, he would “bend” the truth, change a “punch” to a “shove,” backdate statements, warn teachers to “not tell a soul” and stall proceedings to ensure security cameras record over a contested incident.
The video of Valenica:
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Project Veritas revealed on Thursday that after the video of Perry was released, the union president was suspended by Supt. Scott Rocco, who said in a statement, “The true beliefs and values of this school district are not represented in this video and are not aligned with who we are as faculty, staff, administration, and community.”
Project Veritas said Rocco had opened an internal investigation.
In the latest video, the union president Valencia is shown promising protection for a teacher who physically abused a student.
She explained why a teacher who bruised a student in school would not be reprimanded: “Did the kid’s parent come in? No? Nothing happened. … There’s no video? Nothing happened. … [The teacher] is fine.”
Project Veritas said that when its undercover journalist asked if unions normally help teachers who abuse students, Valencia said, ‘It happens, yes it does!'”
Faced with an accusation, Valencia said: “I’m going to get your brother a lawyer. Your brother’s not going to admit anything happened. The only witness is the scumbag kid … he’s got a record.”
O’Keefe said the Union City Education Association “must reveal the identity of the teacher the union is protecting.”
“Any and all parents should be paying attention. This union would rather protect their teachers than their students,” he said.
After the first video was aired, Fox News host Sean Hannity asked, “Who are they protecting, unions or children?”
The New Jersey Education Association declared the video should not be given any “credibility whatsoever,” because it “has something like 26 edits and cuts in it.”
Project Veritas confirmed there were six cuts but insisted the material was not presented out of context.
“We challenge the NJEA to explain in what possible context they find the statements ‘I’m here to defend even the worst people,’ or ‘I need to know the truth, so that we can bend the truth’ acceptable,” Project Veritas said.
After Project Veritas released the first video, ‘Keefe said the unions “would argue that they are protecting the institutions to protect the children.”
“But their actions and words are corrupt. The institutions are not the children. Teachers unions are interested in protecting themselves. It would be nice if [Hamilton Township Education Association President David] Perry were just one bad apple. That is certainly what we will hear in the media. But don’t believe it. If you do, then watch the rest of this series.”
The first video:
[jwplayer Px5yNUQD-pszPfxYQ]
The video, recorded March 27, shows Perry detailing the “steps the teacher’s union would take to protect a teacher who physically abused and threatened middle school students from losing their job.”
“Perry says he would misrepresent the events of altercations between teachers and students by back-dating reports and instructed the teacher to not tell anybody about incidents with students,” Project Veritas said.
“By failing to report this incident, Dr. Perry may have broken the law. According to New Jersey’s Department of Children and Families, ‘In New Jersey, any person having reasonable cause to believe a child has been subjected to abuse or acts of abuse should immediately report this information.'”
The report said Perry “stressed that a teacher who abuses his students needs to come to the union after any incident so that they can create a report that would best protect them from students that come forward about abuse.”
When the Project Veritas undercover journalist asked what could be done to protect a teacher who severely abused a student physically, Perry said he would “bring it down a level” by misrepresenting the facts of the incident.
“We do turn [these reports] around to where, if it was a physical punch, it wasn’t a punch. It was a shove,” he said. And, “If [the teacher] comes to me tomorrow, I’m gonna date the report to the day after the incident.”
There’s a reason.
“I’m gonna strongly advise … [if] the kid’s gonna turn around and say ‘Well [the teacher] threatened me.’ … I can say ‘No. No no no. On March 22nd, the day after the incident, [the teacher] came over to me and told me [what happened.] And we just wanted to put it on record so that nothing more would come about it.'”
Perry said: “It covers [the teacher!] Because he came in and reported it right away and that he was afraid. In other words, if you threatened the kid, you didn’t threaten the kid. You said ‘Knock it off or else.’
He explained he’s working to “defend even the worst people,” and he always requires a teacher who has misbehaved to tell him everything. He said he “need[s] to know the truth so that we can bend the truth.”
