WASHINGTON—Both in person and online, the National Education Association, the nation’s largest union, is lobbying lawmakers against looming big cuts in federal education aid—and a massive health insurance premium hike that would hit more than 21 million people directly, but many more who have any form of health insurance on January 1.
The objective: To counter the anti-worker, anti-public school tilt of the House’s ruling Republicans and the right-wing Republican Trump regime.
Their other objective: To get the government fully open and functioning again, while reversing a massive GOP-enacted health care spending cut, says NEA Deputy Legislative Director Kimberly Johnson Trinca.
The union calculates that health insurance premiums would double for 90% of the 24 million people who get their coverage through the Affordable Care Act/Obamacare exchanges. It will drive up the costs for people on almost any other form of insurance, too.
The deathly duo of Trump and the House GOP also wants to cut federal aid to public schools, particularly to help students from low-income and working families, as well as students of color.
They also plan to eliminate teacher training grants, and they already enacted a massive increase in federal taxpayer-paid “voucher” aid to parents of students in private schools—which can and do discriminate.
And Trump’s Office of Management and Budget has already had the federal Education Department fire half of its workers. The rest are on furlough and face the possibility of permanent “reductions in force” (RIFs)—governments for firing without cause—even after the shutdown ends.
Corporate honchos and the millionaires who back Trump and the GOP, of course, send their kids to expensive private schools and don’t need the voucher money. The GOP-run Congress’s “Big Beautiful Bill” gave it to them, anyway.
The first salvo came from members of the union’s board, who descended on Capitol Hill in early October for in-person meetings with lawmakers and staff, despite the federal shutdown and despite right-wing House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., sending representatives home for three weeks, and counting, rather than bargain over reopening the government.
“Though some congressional offices were thinly staffed and others conducted only virtual meetings, the board got our message across: Stop playing games, work together, and focus on what truly matters to students and educators,” Trinca reported in an e-mail appeal for more grassroots support.
“Specifically, the union’s board members urged Congress to:
- “Include guardrail language in the FY2026 education funding bill to ensure appropriated funds are spent in accordance with the law.” Trump Education Secretary Linda McMahon halted billions of dollars in grants. A federal judge’s ruling forced McMahon, a GOP big giver, to reverse course.
- “Fully fund IDEA—the federal share of excess special education costs, now less than 12%, has never come close to the promised 40%.
- “Support the Paraprofessionals and Education Support Staff Bill of Rights Resolution (SRes158/ HRes297) and other priority bills to recognize the central—and vital—roles that education support professionals play.”
“The main stumbling block to reopening the government is the GOP’s refusal to work with Democrats to find a bipartisan solution and lower healthcare costs for working families and middle-income Americans,” Trinca wrote.
“As matters now stand, premiums will double for 90% of the 24 million people covered by the Affordable Care Act on Jan. 1, 2026—the same day massive tax breaks for the ultra-rich become permanent, thanks to the GOP’s reconciliation bill,” the official name for the “Big Beautiful Bill,” as Trump calls it, which passed on party-line votes.
The automated text and e-mail message NEA wants its members to send to lawmakers makes many of those same points. “Some programs that support public education are temporarily shielded—but the longer the shutdown continues, the greater the risk of serious disruptions in learning,” it warns.
“Republicans are doing nothing to stop the healthcare cost increases that millions of working people and middle-class families are already starting to see. Some families may be forced to drop coverage altogether.
And states will experience delays in funding for WIC, the supplemental nutrition assistance program for low-income women, infants, and young children. If funding stops, states may discontinue services for program participants, putting them all at risk,” the NEA’s e-mail says.
Congressional Democrats are in the union’s corner. The Republicans, who rule Congress, are another matter.
And Republican Speaker Johnson’s refusal to call the House back into session follows a previously used GOP playbook in prior spending fights: Pass a partisan bill, then adjourn and force the Senate into a take-it-or-take-the-consequences position. The difference this time is that the entire country would get hurt by the health spending cuts.
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