EPISODE · Sep 16, 2025 · 2 MIN
15 DAYS: Why Powerful Unions Are Terrified of a Documentary Made by Moms
from Restore Childhood’s Newsletter Podcast · host Natalya Murakhver
The official trailer for "15 Days: The Real Story of America's Pandemic School Closures" releases today—the exact same day Randi Weingarten's book "Why Fascists Fear Teachers" hits shelves.The irony writes itself.You can watch the film HERE.Why I'm Fighting This FightI'm a NYC parent who co-founded Restore Childhood because our children deserved better—and they deserved to know that heroes fought for them when the world failed them.As a young New Yorker on 9/11, I learned that trauma has a window. The first few months after crisis are when we must reflect, share, and analyze—before people build protective walls and forget. I refused to let that happen to our children's stories.A Labor of Love, Three Years in the MakingThis journey began in April 2022. I'd just finished fighting to unmask kids and met Stephanie—a NYC public school teacher who'd lost her job for refusing vaccine mandates while the union stayed silent.What started with viral videos like "The Mask Will Come Off Tomorrow" became something bigger when an LA parent on Twitter connected me to legendary documentarian Eli Steele . A stranger who became family, giving us his expertise to preserve these stories.Our first interview? Dr. Kristen Walsh in her New Jersey home, reading us her unpublished March 2020 letter to the New York Times—proof that pediatricians knew schools shouldn't close. We didn't do "the best we could with the information we had." The information was there.The Road to TruthFrom Baltimore's Johns Hopkins with Dr. Carol Vidal to Stanford with Dr. Jay Bhattacharya. From New York athletes like Garett “BAM” Morgan who lost football scholarships to the Kammer family boys who felt invisible on Zoom.We interviewed Maud Maron fighting alongside me in NYC. Martin Gurri exposing the censorship industrial complex. Tiffany Justice leading the parent revolution. Even Anya Kamenetz from NPR, who knew schools shouldn't stay closed.Our Mission: Heroes for the Next GenerationEvery child locked out of school and sports needs to see that when the world abandoned them, heroes stepped up. Doctors risked careers. Parents fought systems. Rare teachers like Stephanie sacrificed everything for students.We're showing kids that in their darkest hour, people fought for them—and they can fight for others too.A Race Against ForgettingI was deeply inspired by Steven Spielberg's Shoah Foundation—preserving the voices of Holocaust survivors before they were silenced forever.The teachers' unions are betting you'll forget what they did to America’s kids. They want you to believe "kids are resilient" and "everybody recovered."We're doing the opposite.As epidemiologist Dr. Houman Hemmati warns- if we don’t look back and demand accountability, "it will happen again and next time, it will be way worse."🚨 EXCLUSIVE PREMIERE 🚨 15 Days streams FREE exclusively on X for one week only- September 23-30. Follow us on X at @rstorechildhoodThe children are counting on us to remember their stories—and to show them their heroes.Watch. Share. Remember. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit restorechildhood.substack.com/subscribe
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15 DAYS: Why Powerful Unions Are Terrified of a Documentary Made by Moms
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