CTU Bans former Field Rep Elected Delegate from House Meetings

The Chicago Teachers Union has banned Prosser High School Teacher Joey McDermott from attending the House of Delegates meetings after he was elected a city wide delegate last year.

The CTU also filed a lawsuit against McDermott, a former field rep for the union, last year after he won his election.

“In January, I was elected to a three year term as a CTU delegate,” McDermott wrote on his Gofundme page. “CTU blocked me from attending delegate meetings and I filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge in February. CTU responded to that charge by filing a lawsuit against me in March.”

The CTU fired McDermott as a Field Rep in 2019 and he in turn filed an unfair labor practice that was eventually settled. He was then assigned to Prosser High School where he continues to work as a city-wide teacher.

McDermott is a strong critic of the CTU and he ran for Vice President as part of the REAL Caucus against CORE in the last union election three years ago. The next teachers union president election will be this May, 2025.

McDermott, who calls himself “an outspoken critic of CPS, but also CTU” was a beloved Field Rep for the teachers and assistants. Over 1200 CTU members signed a petition to reinstate him after he was fired.

The CTU claimed that McDermott was unprofessional and disrespectful to the union employees he worked with, especially the female staff members.

McDermott has been forced to pay thousands of dollars in legal fees to defend himself against the CTU lawsuit. He started a GoFundMe page asking to help him pay his legal costs. So far he has raised $16k from over 150 different people.

“After discussing this with friends and family, it's our opinion that this lawsuit is not about one person, it’s an attack on union Democracy,” McDermott wrote. “Despite three months of negotiations to reach a settlement, we believe CTU's offers do not respect member voice and Democracy. CTU seeks to ban me from attending CTU meetings, which is a precedent that hurts all our members and our elected representatives.”

The mainstream media has yet to pick up this story. The Sun-Times and Chicago Tribune have attacked the CTU during its tense negotiations with the city to land a new contract. The Tribune has written numerous editorials denouncing the CTU and reported on a lawsuit filed by a right-wing group called Liberty that asked the union to publish its audit reports. The Sun-Times wrote a recent editorial demanding that the CTU settle its contract with only a 3 percent raise for teachers, refuse more teacher planning time and support the principals association to not allow the teachers more power in determining how the schools are run. They even laud former One Percent Mayor Rahm Emanuel when he implemented the longer school day and support closing and consolidating schools, which is completely against the CTU position.

The CTU fight against McDermott appears to be an act to silence union critics. They charge that any dissent empowers the right-wing anti-union forces such as the IL Policy Institute and Wirepoints. The Chicago Tribune publishes regular right wing attacks on the CTU.

McDermott told Second City Teachers he did not agree to be quoted in a story by a Tribune reporter who called about his case.