In a move of stunning hypocrisy, the United Federation of Teachers axed one of its longtime employees — for trying to unionize the powerful labor organization’s own workers, it was charged yesterday.
Jim Callaghan, a veteran writer for the teachers union, told The Post he was booted from his $100,000-a-year job just two months after he informed UFT President Michael Mulgrew that he was trying to unionize some of his co-workers.
“I was fired for trying to start a union at the UFT,” said a dumbfounded Callaghan, who worked for the union’s newsletter and as a speechwriter for union leaders for the past 13 years.
Callaghan said he personally told Mulgrew on June 9 about his intention to try to organize nonunionized workers at UFT headquarters.
“I told him I want to have the same rights that teachers have,” said Callaghan, 63, of Staten Island. “He told me he didn’t want that, that he wanted to be able to fire whoever he wanted to.”
The UFT has long strenuously resisted city efforts to make it easier for school administrators to fire teachers.
“This is the exact antithesis of what they preach, and Michael Mulgrew is the biggest hypocrite out there,” Callaghan fumed.
Callaghan said he’s planning to file a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board against the UFT for illegally blocking his unionizing effort, and he added he would slap the union with an age-discrimination lawsuit.
A UFT spokesman had little to say about Callaghan’s charges.
“We do not comment on personnel matters, but the overwhelming majority of people who work at the UFT are represented by unions,” said UFT spokesman Peter Kadushin.
Callaghan said that yesterday morning, he was hauled into a meeting with UFT officials, including CFO David Hickey, and told only that he was being fired from his job and had a half-hour to clear out of the office.
“They gave me no reason, no letter, no cause at all,” said Callaghan, who insisted that he has received no reprimands or notices about problems with his work. He noted that he wrote six stories in the most recent newsletter for teachers.
Callaghan said the union-busting bullying continued after he was told he was fired, when UFT leaders called in a detail of six uniformed cops to remove him from his office because he wasn’t leaving fast enough.
Callaghan said he decided to unionize the 12 UFT writers after a colleague was fired last year without cause.
“We have no protections and no disciplinary process,” he said.