Ángel J. Valencia
Ángel J. Valencia is a Senior Counsel at the Liberty Justice Center, where he litigates to defend individual liberties and challenge government overreach.
Case Update: A Cook County judge has denied the Chicago Teachers Union’s effort to shut down this case and has ordered discovery to move forward. Plaintiffs will now begin the process of uncovering whether CTU has met its obligations to provide full, unabridged financial disclosures to its members.
Case Background: On October 8, the Liberty Justice Center filed a lawsuit on behalf of four Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) members, demanding that CTU produce an audit after failing to do so for four years.
Under CTU’s Constitution and Bylaws, Article VI, Section 1(d), the union is required to “furnish an audited report of the Union which shall be printed in the Union’s publication.” However, CTU has failed to meet this obligation since it published an audit only covering the first half of 2019.
“CTU members deserve to know where their money is going. After four years of silence, it’s time for transparency,” said plaintiff Phillip Weiss, who has been a CTU member since 1998. “This lawsuit isn’t just about us—it’s about the more than 25,000 educators across Chicago who rely on the union to uphold its commitments.”
The Liberty Justice Center previously sent a demand letter to the union on behalf of several anonymous CTU members, offering the opportunity to comply and avoid litigation. A week after receiving the letter, CTU’s lawyers requested the identity of the plaintiffs, purportedly to confirm their union membership.
Instead, the union used this information to launch into intimidation tactics to suppress dissent and distract from the core issue: its failure to provide financial transparency to members. On October 8, CTU President Stacy Davis Gates attempted to publicly shame the plaintiffs on a member-wide call by singling them out by name and invoking “Project 2025” to falsely frame their request for transparency as part of a “right-wing” effort.
After CTU failed to provide the missing audits by the letter’s deadline, the Liberty Justice Center filed the lawsuit to compel the audits’ release.
“We are proud to stand with Chicago educators in their fight for accountability and transparency,” said Dean McGee, Senior Counsel for Educational Freedom at Liberty Justice Center. “CTU leadership must uphold its obligations to the teachers it represents.”
Weiss v. Chicago Teachers Union was filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County on October 8, 2024. The Liberty Justice Center is representing the members pro bono.
A copy of the Liberty Justice Center’s demand letter is available here.
stop public union corruption and show us the audit–it’s the law!
Ángel J. Valencia is a Senior Counsel at the Liberty Justice Center, where he litigates to defend individual liberties and challenge government overreach.
James McQuaid is the Managing Staff Attorney at Liberty Justice Center where he assists in cases to protect the rights to free speech, economic liberty, private property, and other Constitutional rights in courts across the country.
Sara Albrecht | February 20, 2026 (Crain’s Chicago Business) Chicago Teachers Union leaders would like the public to believe that recent federal scrutiny of their finances is part of a right-wing conspiracy — an attack on educators, students, and social justice itself. That framing may be effective rally rhetoric. It...
By: Tahman Bradley and Ethan Illers | November 25, 2025 CHICAGO (WGN-TV) – The Chicago Teachers Union is at the center of a Capitol Hill probe and is now cooperating with a Congressional inquiry into its finances regarding whether the CTU has been keeping financial audits from members. The Republican-controlled...
Author: Maggie Little (Read Lion)—A judge has allowed a lawsuit against the Chicago Teachers Union to move forward, as the union’s own members have been suing to demand financial transparency. The lawsuit stems from the union’s refusal to release its audits for five years, despite its bylaws requiring it to...
Author: Chris Coffey (Illinois Policy)—The Chicago Teachers Union suffered a defeat last week when a judge denied its request to dismiss a case filed against it demanding the release of audits its own rules mandate. In Weiss v. Chicago Teachers Union, several CTU members are challenging the union’s failure to...
(Off the Press)—The politically powerful Chicago Teachers Union can’t escape a lawsuit accusing them of violating their members’ rights by refusing to release years’ worth of financial audits, allegedly in breach of their own governing rules. On May 14, a Cook County judge rejected the CTU’s bid to dismiss the...
(Legal Newsline)—In a recent legal development, Judge David B. Atkins of the Circuit Court of Cook County has ruled in favor of the Liberty Justice Center in the case of Weiss v. Chicago Teachers Union (CTU). The court denied CTU’s motion to dismiss the case, marking a significant step for...
(Cook County Record)—The politically powerful Chicago Teachers Union can’t escape a lawsuit accusing them of violating their members’ rights by refusing to release years’ worth of financial audits, allegedly in breach of their own governing rules. On May 14, a Cook County judge rejected the CTU’s bid to dismiss the...
Author: Chicago City Wire Reports (Chicago City Wire)—A Cook County judge has ruled that a lawsuit against the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) can proceed, rejecting the union’s attempt to have the case dismissed. The lawsuit, Weiss v. Chicago Teachers Union, was filed in October 2024 by longtime CTU member and...