Three Village teacher who wished death to Trump supporters on Facebook can keep job, arbitrator rules

An arbitrator rejected the Three Village school district’s attempt to terminate a tenured science teacher for posting on her private Facebook page a desire for supporters of President Donald Trump to suffer a slow, painful death.

"America is no longer the land of the free," read Pamila Pahuja's since-deleted post, which criticized U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids and included a descriptive account of the slow demise — "you slowly wither away while struggling to gasp" — she wished on "all Trump supporters."

The state-appointed arbitrator, Barry J. Peek, instead issued a three-month unpaid suspension to Pahuja, citing her "genuine remorse" and her two-plus decades as "an exemplary teacher without any prior disciplinary record."

The arbitrator’s 42-page decision, obtained by Newsday last week from the state Education Department following a records request, illustrates the highly charged political climate under Trump while serving as another example of the high threshold that school districts must meet to terminate tenured teachers.

The arbitrator also ordered Pahuja, who taught science at R.C. Murphy Middle School in Stony Brook, to undergo sensitivity training funded by the district. The ruling was issued last August and the school board approved it days later.

Three Village district spokeswoman Denise Nash declined to comment on the arbitrator's ruling or say where Pahuja is now assigned to teach, saying she cannot comment on personnel matters.

Pahuja and her attorney from New York State United Teachers, the state's largest teachers union, did not return messages last week seeking comment.

According to the arbitrator's report, Pahuja "insists she had an understandably emotional reaction" to Trump's announcement about ICE raids and was concerned about how those may impact her students. The arbitrator wrote that she "admits that her stress and emotional reaction" to the forthcoming raids led her to make a "poor decision to copy and post a friend’s Facebook post onto her page." She said she "did not fully read the content before posting it."

Although Peek determined Pahuja's actions did not rise to termination, he said she "must be held accountable for reposting such a divisive and disturbing post on Facebook."

"It went beyond partisan politics when it suggested that the opposition die a slow death," he added.

Peek declined to comment for this story.

The district began the state-mandated process seeking to terminate Pahuja in February 2025, three weeks after her Jan. 18 Facebook post.

Although Pahuja told school administrators she immediately deleted the post once she heard it had been screenshotted and circulated in right-wing Facebook groups, it proved too late.

School administrators said parents and community members inundated them with calls, emails and social media messages about Pahuja’s post, according to the arbitrator’s report.

The superintendent spent 100 hours "reading and responding to" emails and calls and held several in-person meetings with parents and district residents, while the middle school principal spent 50 hours on the matter, the report said.

The district also argued that Pahuja "irreparably harmed" her relationship with her students because of her message. Some parents sought to remove their children from Pahuja’s middle school class.

"The district insists [Pahuja] can no longer perform her professional responsibilities for the district and that she is no longer fit to continue in her position as a teacher," the arbitrator’s report said.

The district reassigned her to the administration building prior to the arbitrator’s decision, according to the report.

It was a stunning turn for a teacher who had built a stellar reputation, having served a decade on the district’s positive behavioral intervention and support committee and on its anti-racism task force since 2019, according to the report.

Employed by the district since 2002, Pahuja consistently received "highly effective" ratings and regularly coached the Science Olympiad team to regional and national recognition, per the report. 

According to the report, she told the district the post included someone else's words, but that she stood by posting it and has "the right to say what [she] wants" on her private Facebook page. 

The arbitrator rejected that argument, writing that she "should have been aware of the fact that someone could have taken a screenshot and shared the post with others on social media." Peek also noted that while she did not accept friend requests from her students, some of her Facebook friends were school colleagues who "would have seen the post and reacted to it."

"Teachers hold a unique position of influence, not just within the classroom but also in the broader community," he added.

Similar cases in which teachers faced scrutiny for politically charged social media posts have occurred on Long Island and nationwide, including a Westhampton teacher whose comments on TikTok about the assassination of political activist Charlie Kirk angered some parents.

Pahuja made $169,050 during the 2024-25 school year, according to Newsday's database of teacher and administrator salaries.

By Jim Baumbach

jim.baumbach@newsday.com

Jim Baumbach is an award-winning investigative reporter at Newsday, where he has worked since 1998. He spent two decades in the sports department, where he covered every professional team and league, including events such as the Super Bowl and World Series.