The hyper-politicization and ideological takeover of the National Parent Teacher Association (PTA)
Investigations
SUMMARY
This report exposes the politicization of the National Parent Teacher Association (PTA) and its advocacy for far-left policy positions such as anti-racism and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), affirmation of gender identity and transgenderism, and other leftwing social justice ideologies. The organization is also set to platform at its 2026 annual convention a speaker that has a long history of anti-semitism and anti-Israel activism.
While the public tends to view the PTA as a neutral actor helping to organize family events and raise funds for schools, the national organization and many state and local affiliates have become left-leaning political entities driving radical ideologies into schools, communities, and even state legislation. For example, a recent report exposes the Montgomery County Public Schools (MD) PTA hosting a meeting where it briefed families on “ICE Response & Organizing Tools.” The event focused on various actions parents and community members can take including warning of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activities and other ICE related protocols.
The following information highlights the core beliefs of the National PTA, how it advocates for far-left ideologies throughout the organization and PTA affiliates, and supporting documents and examples to verify the PTAs positions.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- The PTA’s 2026 annual convention features a session titled “Public School Strong: Organizing our Communities to Defend Students and Strengthen Public Education” which is an “initiative uniting parents, educators, students and community members to defend public schools against book bans, funding cuts, voucher and privatization schemes, and threats to immigrant students and families.” The session’s speaker works for Race Forward, a National Education Association (NEA) funded organization and partner, and has a long history of antisemitism and anti-Israel activism.
- The PTA describes the “DEI Journey at PTA” as moving from a “Color/Identity-Blind” stage that does “not lift up issues of diversity, inclusion and equity in any regular or routine way” to an “equity” or “advanced” stage that focuses on “systems to improve equity.” The primary goal of the equity stage is the “integration of an equity lens into all aspects of the association’s work.”
- A document titled “How to Talk about Race & Injustice in America” tells parents it’s “never too early to talk about race with your children” and links to an article titled, “Your 5-Year-Old Is Already Racially Biased.” The resource also promotes Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism and the now removed National Museum of African American History & Culture (NMAAHC) webpage which included topics such as “being antiracist,” “social identities and systems of oppression,” and “whiteness.”
- The organization uses LGBTQ youth suicide and depression statistics to justify pro-transgender affirming policies, while opposing any therapy that doesn’t immediately affirm a trans identity, labeling it “conversion therapy;” it also says it will “assist states, districts, councils and local units” in planning programs to “affirm” students’ gender identities.
- Despite the PTA claiming it does not promote critical race theory, an organization position statement decries the “culture of oppression that permeates the United States” and claims institutional racism is embedded in the “fabric of our nation.”
- The National PTA claims that school curricula should “develop critical consciousness by recognizing racism, classism, and other issues in the world.” Critical consciousness trains students to find/ seek out how society oppresses the “marginalized” populations.
- In 2022, the National PTA was invited by the Biden Administration’s Department of Education to be part of a “National Parents and Families Engagement Council.” Defending Education, America First Legal Foundation (AFL), and Fight for Schools and Families, sued Miguel Cardona, U.S. Secretary of Education, the United States Department of Education over the council alleging violation of the Federal Advisory Committee Act.
- In 2024, Defending Education joined a coalition to ask the National PTA to remove antisemitic and anti-Israel bias from its Multicultural Reference Guide.
- Several state and local PTAs have a history of working with Planned Parenthood (PPFA) on sexual education initiatives and joining coalitions for or against state legislation.
- The National PTA has received $1,147,988 from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and taken in $1,982,500 in contributions from the Silicon Valley Community Foundation.
NATIONAL PARENT TEACHER ASSOCIATION (PTA)
What is the National PTA?
The National PTA bills itself as a nonpartisan champion for children, families, teachers, and community leaders united around education and family engagement. However, its policy advocacy tells a different story.
Rather than focusing on the school-level issues most parents associate with PTA work, the organization consistently pushes progressive priorities. And due to its size and influence, PTA’s left-wing stances tend to trickle down to local and state affiliates whether they like it or not.
Left-Wing Policy Activism
National PTA’s own internal guidance confirms that its resolutions are advocacy documents that “outline the opinion, will or intent of the association” and drive its policy agenda.
Every year, hundreds of PTA leaders descend on Washington for the National Legislative Conference, a major lobbying event. The 2024 edition featured First Lady Jill Biden.
This year’s conference (March 2–4, Alexandria, VA) includes sessions on supporting LGBTQ+ students, protecting immigrant families from enforcement, and navigating recent federal policy shifts on immigration.
LGBTQ Policy
National PTA stresses the importance of using “appropriate, affirming language to create inclusive environments for LGBTQ children.” The PTA links to the Human Rights Campaign’s glossary as an additional language guide for members.
During its 2026 annual convention, National PTA will host an event on “Understanding and Supporting Expansive LGBTQ+ Identities” that discusses “intersex experiences and nonbinary gender identities to bisexual+ identities, asexuality and aromanticism.”
National PTA uses LGBTQ youth suicide and depression statistics to justify pro-transgender affirming policies, while opposing any therapy that does immediately affirm a trans identity, labeling it “conversion therapy.”
The organization says it will “assist states, districts, councils and local units” in planning programs to “affirm” students’ gender identities.
National PTA backs the Equality Act, which adds sexual orientation and gender identity to federal civil rights law, a move critics say creates religious-liberty conflicts and upends traditional sex-based rules.
At its 2016 convention, National PTA passed a resolution pushing to recognize LGBTQ individuals as a protected class under federal civil rights law.
The resolution backed Obama-era Education and Justice Department guidance directing schools to treat transgender students under Title IX, guidance that has since been rolled back. National PTA advocates for federal legislation explicitly protecting LGBTQ status, including school policies on training and supportive environments.
School Discipline
In 2023, National PTA lobbied Congress to replace traditional school discipline with restorative justice practices by discouraging “disciplinary practices that are harmful, overly punitive or disproportionately applied to certain students based on their disability, race, religion or other protected characteristic.”
Immigration Policy
National PTA has taken the position that schools should not voluntarily report undocumented students to ICE — citing the Supreme Court’s Plyler v. Doe ruling — and supports designating schools as “sensitive locations” where immigration enforcement is off-limits.
That PTA states that “School districts should not … report undocumented students to federal, state or local authorities carrying out immigration enforcement because such actions may cause harm to the overall school environment and students’ educational outcomes.” The organization also supports the “confidentiality of school records, including records that pertain to the immigration status of children.”
National PTA suggests that groups host “all meetings and events at locations that would be designated protected areas under federal, state, and local law” and work to pass “Safe Zones resolutions to ensure that school districts have a policy in place for when an authority carrying out immigration enforcement shows up at school.”
Antisemitism/ Anti-Israel Affiliations
National PTA’s annual convention in 2026 features an event led by Asma Elhuni titled, “Public School Strong: Organizing our Communities to Defend Students and Strengthen Public Education.” The event promotes activism to “defend public schools against book bans, funding cuts, voucher and privatization schemes, and threats to immigrant students and families.”
Update: Asma Elhuni has been removed from the 2026 conference website but we cannot get anyone from the National PTA to respond to us about whether or not she will or will not be participating in the conference.
Asma Elhuni is a Lead Organizer for Race Forward’s Honest Education, Action & Leadership Together initiative. Elhuni “helped launch the initiative where states across the country organize to protect, promote, strengthen, and transform public education.”
After the New Hampshire House passed a resolution in 2022 in support of Israel, Elhuni took to social media to post “The NH House decided supporting Israel in their oppression against Palestinians is important to make known.”
Elhuni is also a “Palestinian liberation” activist and an organizer with American Muslims for Palestine. The Anti-Defamation League says American Muslims for Palestine is “at the core of the anti-Israel and anti-Zionist movement in the United States,” citing the organization’s antisemitic rhetoric and support for violence against Israel, such as praising Hamas for the October 7, 2023 attack.
Elhuni has posted, “From the River To The Sea Palestine Will Be Free,” a slogan that some use to call for the erasure of the State of Israel or ethnic cleansing of Jews.
In 2024, Race Forward received $322,500 from the National Education Association (NEA). The NEA has joined with Public School Strong, part of Race Forward’s Honest Education, Action & Leadership (HEAL) Together initiative – for which Elhuni is the lead organizer, to “mobilize for public education.” The campaign aims to “mobilize everyday folks to support equity in our nation’s public schools and protect schools from the rising tide of extremist attacks against public education.”
On May 3, 2026, Elhuni is slated to speak at the Muslim Youth Civic Leadership Intensive hosted by CAIR-New Jersey and the Muslim Center of Greater Princeton.
Parental Rights
National PTA supports the “Bill of Rights for Students and Parents,” framed as a Democratic counter to competing parents’ rights proposals.
National PTA called the resolution a “significant step in ensuring all students—including students from historically marginalized communities—have access to a high-quality, equitable and well-rounded education in a welcoming, supportive and inclusive school.”
Curriculum, Materials and Training
National PTA calls for K-12 schools to offer “inclusive curricula” with a focus on “historically targeted and marginalized groups”
- Its board adopted this stance in 2020 and expanded it in 2022 to broaden the groups covered and push for teacher professional development tied to inclusive curriculum delivery.
- On reading materials, a position dating to 2003 and updated in 2022 holds that materials should be “inclusive” and cover “gender identity, sexual orientation and sexual health.”
- The organization says curricula should “develop critical consciousness by recognizing racism, classism, and other issues in the world.”
National PTA says schools should train their entire staff on “implicit bias and culturally appropriate curriculum.”
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Guidance and Resources
National PTA has made DEI central to its mission, explicitly targeting “historically marginalized and underrepresented populations.” It stresses that “equity” means “fairness in resources, opportunities and outcomes.”The organization describes the “DEI Journey at PTA” as moving from a “Color/Identity-Blind” stage that does “not lift up issues of diversity, inclusion and equity in any regular or routine way” to an “equity” or “advanced” stage that focuses on “systems to improve equity.” The primary goal of this equity stage is the “integration of an equity lens into all aspects of the association’s work.”
National PTA has published a guide for “Responding to Pushback Against Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Efforts” that notes, “Our mission requires that diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) be central to our work and used in our day-to-day decisions and actions.”
National PTA’s DEI portfolio includes:
- Racial and economic justice showcases;
- A podcast featuring episodes focused on DEI;
- A microlearning series on bias, microaggressions, allyship, and ableism;
- A guide encouraging “explicitly anti-racist” work in schools;
- An “Awareness Calendar” that includes holidays like Disability Pride Month, International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, LGBTQ History Month and Transgender Awareness Week & Day of Remembrance.
The National PTA’s “Multicultural Reference Guide” includes links to the Human Rights Campaign, the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Learning for Justice lessons, The Trevor Project, and Unidos US.
The document titled “How to Talk about Race & Injustice in America” tells parents it’s “never too early to talk about race with your children” and links to an article titled, “Your 5-Year-Old Is Already Racially Biased.” The resource also promotes Robin DiAngelo’s White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism and the now removed National Museum of African American History & Culture (NMAAHC) webpage which includes topics such as “being antiracist,” “social identities and systems of oppression,” and “whiteness.”
A position statement decries the “culture of oppression that permeates the United States” and claims institutional racism is embedded in the “fabric of our nation.”
The group has also distributed a messaging memo attempting to distance itself from critical race theory while continuing to promote its core concepts.
During its 2026 annual convention, National PTA will host a “Diversity and Inclusion Breakfast” that “offers guidance” to local PTAs on implementing DEI.
Funding and Financials
National PTA is funded through a mix of contributions, including corporate/foundation gifts and individual donations, membership-related revenue and sponsorship/program partnerships. From 2018 to 2021, the organization received $1,147,988 from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and taken in $1,982,500 in contributions from the Silicon Valley Community Foundation from 2018 to 2024. Silicon Valley Community Foundation gave International Planned Parenthood Federation, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and its affiliates $104M+ during that same time period.
Corporate partners include companies such as AT&T, Bayer, Discord, Google, TikTok, Uber, and Walmart.
STATE AND LOCAL PARENT TEACHER ASSOCIATIONS
Included below are links and examples of state and local PTAs that show a commitment to DEI and other far-left ideologies. This is not comprehensive and will be updated over time.
ARIZONA
Arizona PTA
A Planned Parenthood Arizona 2012-2013 Annual Report notes that the Arizona PTA was part of a statewide coalition in support of then Senator Katie Hobbs’ bill that would require schools adopt a comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) curriculum.
CALIFORNIA
California PTA
The California PTA includes Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion as a core “Focus Area” of the organization.
Second District PTA – San Francisco
The Second District PTA states that in 2020 it began a “formal effort to address Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in our daily practice.” It adds that “The tip sheets about working with African American parents from the National PTA are offensive and used deficit-based language, contrary to tip sheets about working with other racial/ethnic groups” and that “effective DEI work can’t be about Black and Brown people educating everyone else. White people need to do their work first.”
Spreckels PTA
The Spreckles PTA’s “DEI Resources” page includes links to sites and topics such as “Raising Anti-Racist Children,” “Anti-Bias Education,” and Learning for Justice.
COLORADO
Eisenhower Elementary PTA (Boulder Valley School District)
Boulder Valley School District’s Eisenhower Elementary PTA promotes “Anit-Racism Resources” which include links to a “Black Lives Matter reading room for kids,” “Raising Kids Who Embrace Race,” and other materials.
FLORIDA
Hillsborough County Council PTA/PTSA
The Hillsborough County Council PTA/PTSA directs local PTAs to use National PTA DEI materials, pointing members to the National PTA’s “extensive resources” for implementing diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.
Resources include guidance such as “How To Welcome Diverse Perspectives Into Your PTA.”
KANSAS
Kansas PTA
MARYLAND
Montgomery County Public Schools
Montgomery County Public Schools PTA meeting briefed families on “ICE Response & Organizing Tools”
Read the full report here.
NEW YORK
Rensselaer High School PTA
According to a 2011 Upper Hudson Planned Parenthood (UHPP) newsletter, the UHPP had a “series of meetings” with high school administration and staff, as well as the School Board and PTA to assist in helping “define the scope of the problem, identified appropriate curricula and provided guidance on condom distribution models.”
NORTH CAROLINA
North Carolina PTA
The North Carolina PTA’s 2025 NCPTA Convention featured a workshop titled “Mirror, Window, Door – A Guide to DEI and Perspective” which states that “building a truly inclusive environment requires more than good intentions – it requires intentional perspective taking.” The workshop “utilizes three essential tools for deepening your commitment to DIE” including examining one’s “own identity, assumptions, and biases” and moving “beyond reflection to identity specific, actionable steps you can take to dismantle barriers, advocate for equitable practices, and open up opportunities for all students and families.”
The speaker for the session is noted as having research interests in “culturally responsive teaching, critical race theory, and social justice education.”
The convention also included a “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Breakfast” which featured activities such as “Understanding Bias and Privilege: Who’s in Your Circle” and “Understanding Bias and Privilege: Privilege Reflection Exercise.”
OHIO
Ohio PTA
Ohio PTA’s Position Statement titled “Affirmation of Transgender Care and Anti-Racism Work in Ohio Schools” states that its “Board of Directors joins youth advocates across our state as we condemn any legislative efforts that do not support and care for LGBTQIA+ youth or silences important conversations about sexual orientation, gender identity, systemic racism, anti-racism, or diversity, equity, and inclusion.”
Other Ohio PTA position statements include “Opposing the State of Ohio EdChoice Scholarship (Voucher) Program” and to “Advance Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Ohio Schools.”
OREGON
Abernethy PTA
Portland Public Schools Abernethy Elementary PTA promotes Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion and facilitates a DEI committee. The PTA defines an “equity lens” as “any program, practice, decision, or action, the impact on all students is addressed, with strategic focus on marginalized student groups.”
The webpage also notes that the school library has a “racial justice parent resource library purchased through PTA Mini Grants” that features books such as “White Awareness,” “Waking up White,” “White Rage,” “White Like Me,” “Race, Whiteness, and Education,” “Raising White Kids,” and “How To Be An Antiracist.”
UTAH
Utah PTA
In 2012, the Utah PTA joined with Planned Parenthood Association of Utah and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Utah to oppose HB363.
VIRGINIA
Fairfax County Council PTA
In September 2022, the Fairfax County Council PTA opposed a Virginia Department of Education proposal on transgender students, arguing the policy conflicted with National PTA resolutions protecting LGBTQ individuals as a protected class.
The council explicitly cited the National PTA’s LGBTQ protected-class resolution and directed local PTAs to review National PTA materials on LGBTQ inclusion and DEI resources to guide advocacy at the local level.
WASHINGTON
Washington State PTA
The Washington State PTA (WSPTA) formally incorporates National PTA resolutions and position statements into its policy platform and states that state resolutions may supplement but cannot conflict with National PTA policy.
The WSPTA passed a resolution in 2020 titled “Dismantling Institutional and Systemic Racism.”
In January 2026, WSPTA also issued guidance—developed in consultation with National PTA—on how PTA members should respond if immigration enforcement actions occur at school events, advising members to coordinate with school administrators and understand legal limits on enforcement access to school spaces.
Mercer Island PTA
Seattle Council PTSA
The Seattle Council PTSA states that its local resolutions “may not conflict with National PTA resolutions.” For example, its 2018 gun violence prevention resolution explicitly aligned with National PTA policy, citing National PTA positions on firearm safety, mental-health supports, and prevention programs while endorsing the March for Our Lives and National School Walkout.
The organization’s “Family & Community Engagement” page links to a Learning for Justice resource titled “Becoming a Village: A liberatory, whole-child approach and collective effort to nurture all our children.”
Direct Local Action
Some National PTA resolutions explicitly encourage downstream advocacy. For example, the organization’s LGBTQ resolution calls on state and local PTAs to review school policies and support revisions to create “safe and inclusive” environments.
National PTA has also coordinated national advocacy campaigns. On May 12, 2025, National PTA and 109 state and local PTAs sent a letter to the House Committee on Ways and Means urging opposition to the Educational Choice for Children Act, a federal tax credit scholarship program for private-school tuition.
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