A document the National Education Association filed with the U.S. Department of Labor in 2011 indicates that the teachers union donated $100,000 to Media Matters for America nearly two years ago, describing it as a payment for “public relations costs.” In the months that followed, Media Matters’ online coverage of teachers unions increased, focusing largely on attacking the FOX News Channel and other media outlets it considers “conservative” in nature.

The $100,000 payment was first documented in “Shadowbosses: Government Unions Control America and Rob Taxpayers Blind,” a book by Citadel international politics professor Mallory Factor published on August 21.

“[T]o ensure that NEA’s agenda makes its way in the media,” Factor wrote, “NEA has given $100,000 to Media Matters, the George Soros-funded liberal ‘charitable organization’ dedicated to targeting mythical right-wing media bias.”

The Daily Caller has obtained an electronic document verifying Factor’s claim. It is available on a website operated by the Department of Labor’s Office of Labor-Management Standards.

The data is from the Labor Department’s LM-2 form, a disclosure required whenever a union disburses $5,000 or more to an outside entity. In one such 2011 filing, the NEA reported paying Media Matters $100,000 and referred to it as a “political organization.”

Complicating matters for the teachers union is the fact that the same report categorized the $100,000 payment as a “union administration” cost instead of as a political expenditure.

Two more labor unions also reported in 2011 that they had made contributions to Media Matters: The AFL-CIO gave $10,000 and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees gave $5,000. Both categorized their respective donations as “political activities.”

The NEA’s choice to call its much larger payment a “union administration” cost leaves open the possibility that it could charge the expense to non-members -- known as “agency fee payers” -- who are nonetheless covered by the union’s collective bargaining agreement.

NEA spokesman Steven Grant told TheDC that “the Media Matters support is not reported as chargeable for agency fee purposes.” But his union’s non-member fee payers have not yet seen the legally required statement of expenses covering the 2010-2011 school year.

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Editor's Note: Propaganda, at the hands of Soros and Media Matters, hasn't seen a better day since Nazi Germany...


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