John,

Yesterday was a truly remarkable day of solidarity and fighting back for our kids, our families, public education and our communities. When we started planning the March 4 Protect Our Kids actions less than a month ago, I knew AFT members were feeling overwhelmed and angry about this administration’s attacks on public schools and colleges. But in the weeks since then, we came together to channel those feelings into more than 2,000 positive, locally driven actions nationwide!

The coalition of educators, parents, students, community members and elected officials sent a clear message that it’s not OK to deny students the education they need and deserve in order to give big tax cuts to the wealthy and fund private, boutique schools.

Local and national media and social media were flooded with images like these:

Click to watch the video highlights.

You can click the video above to watch highlights or scroll through our Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram, Threads or Twitter pages to see more photos and media coverage.

Robbing Peter to pay Elon is a cruel and irresponsible thing to do to our schoolchildren who really need this funding. Our members have fought for years to secure funding for the programs they know are helping kids, and we are not going to let a bunch of billionaires come in and take it.

What we are seeing on the ground across America is that people—parents and teachers, together—are speaking up to protect our kids and fight to defend direct funding for career and technical educational programs, hiring and retaining educators for students with special needs, and other local priorities.

We will keep you updated on our next steps, but at the very least, please contact your members of Congress to urge them to say no to education cuts.

Thank you again.

In unity,
Randi Weingarten
AFT President