Caught on Camera: Teachers Union Officials Advise Fraud to Cover up Child Abuse

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• “You don’t have to be honest. I mean we can talk in theory.” –Paul Diamond, Executive Vice President, Yonkers Teacher Federation

• “I don’t’ care if it’s the phys ed teacher you went to high school with, you don’t fucking tell anybody anything…Because old loose lips sink ships.” — Patricia Puleo, President, Yonkers Teacher Federation

• “You could. Your parents could have been down there, or your cousin could have been down there, or your brother and they were taken by drug dealers and you literally had to go bail them out and you didn’t know what to do and you lost your mind.” — Patricia Puleo, President, Yonkers Teacher Federation

James O’Keefe, President and founder of Project Veritas released a new video today as part of a new series documenting the egregious behavior upheld by teachers unions across the country.

In this first video, Project Veritas journalists and James O’Keefe visit with the United Federation of Teachers office in Yonkers to meet with senior union officials to find out what would happen to a teacher who was guilty of abusing a child. Shockingly, our journalists found the union officials willing to engage in a cover up of child abuse and the violation of workplace rules. The officials can even be seen helping the journalist plot a cover up on hidden camera.

In O’Keefe’s video, Paul Diamond, the Executive Vice President for the Yonkers Federation of Teachers was caught on camera helping a PV journalist posing as a teacher who hit a child with covering up the incident. “ I think there are three scenarios that possibly could have occurred. Everybody forgot about it, which sounds like something that happened three weeks ago and nothing is being done about it sounds like it’s been forgotten.”

When O’Keefe and the journalist mention that harm may have been done to the child, the Union official who appeared more concerned with the welfare of the teacher over the child said, “You don’t have to be honest. I mean we can talk in theory… You’re a tenured teacher and you have. Tenured means you can only be dismissed if the board convinced a stranger that they’re right.” Diamond’s actions reveal that the Union itself prioritizes protecting adults over children, which is contrary to the ethical standards of educators. It also reveals a flaw in the system if a teacher can get away with abusing child.

When the Union official made it clear that the hypothetical situation involving child abuse would not get the tenured teacher fired, the PV journalist and O’Keefe decided to take the situation up a notch to see what else the union would be willing to cover up. “I was gone for two weeks,” said O’Keefe.

After asking O’Keefe whether or not he has an explanation for his lengthy absence from work, Diamond takes the issue to Patricia Puleo, President, Yonkers Teacher Federation, who proceeded to provide a number of creative cover-ups for O’Keefe. When O’Keefe mentioned that he went to Mexico for those two weeks, and said he could have a family member there, Puleo shockingly said, “You could. Your parents could have been down there, or your cousin could have been down there, or your brother and they were taken by drug dealers and you literally had to go bail them out and you didn’t know what to do and you lost your mind. You know people lose their mind. It was an emergency. Look, fall on your sword. You are so right I failed in my duty to call in and say I need emergency family medical leave. I failed to do that. The worst they’ll do is deduct you two weeks pay. That’s it.”

As you can see in the video, union officials have no problem covering up child abuse and fabricating situations for teachers who probably shouldn’t be teaching. Although the union is supposed to be a representative board for teachers, it has become a tool for covering up malfeasance and its top officials are overseeing the corruption and abuse. Before leaving the union office, the union president had this advice for our journalist and O’Keefe, “You don’t talk to anybody. I don’t care if it’s your best friend. I don’t care if it’s the phys ed teacher you went to high school with, you don’t fucking tell anybody anything…Because old loose lips sink ships.”

“Our new video exposes how teachers unions prioritize the needs of teachers over the welfare of children, at all costs. Corruption within the union and the protection of tenured teachers needs to be addressed immediately so that a teacher who admits to harming a child isn’t protected, and America’s educational system isn’t supporting hypothetical drug cartel cover-ups. In upcoming videos in this series, we’ll continue to expose how teacher’s unions excuse malfeasance and cover-up corruption and abuse,” says Project Veritas President James O’Keefe.