29 Aug 2023 FEP Turns up the Heat on the Biggest ESG Offenders

BlackRock, proxy advisory firms and other behemoths have been using their size and influence — not to mention your investments — to force other corporations to adopt a leftwing agenda.

Scott Shepard

But Free Enterprise Project Director Scott Shepard says plans are under way to push back against these Big Bads and their extreme environmental, social and governance (ESG) agendas:

In response to hearings by the U.S. House’s ESG Taskforce, letters from state attorneys general and treasurers, and other indications that their pervasive political and policy bias is under scrutiny, BlackRock, ISS, Glass Lewis and others have made claims of impartiality in the way they conduct their businesses, vote proxies on behalf of their investors, and pressure companies about how to run their businesses.

These claims are demonstrably false.

None of BlackRock, State Street, Vanguard, ISS or Glass Lewis has ever — so far as we can tell — voted or recommended even one single time for any center/right shareholder proposals, while pushing leftwing environmental and social proposals regularly.

So we at FEP have begun a campaign to force them to move, at least a little, toward genuine neutrality.

Discussions have begun in some quarters; we will let you know as events develop whether the Big 5 drivers of leftwing ESG start to mend their ways or are proven to be false in ways that will require further shareholder — and potentially legal — intervention.