25 Feb 2025 Oh Deere. Apple and John Deere Still Haven’t Awoken to the Risks of Going Woke

Shareholder Activists to Press Companies on Their Support for DEI and HRC

Washington, D.C. — At this week’s annual shareholder meetings of Apple Inc. and Deere & Company, shareholder activists with the National Center for Public Policy Research’s Free Enterprise Project (FEP) will present proposals holding the companies accountable for leftist policies that pose both legal and financial risks.

On Tuesday, February 25, at the Apple Inc. shareholder meeting, FEP will present Proposal 6, entitled “Request to Cease DEI Efforts.”

In its supporting statement, FEP notes that despite the growing risks facing companies that maintain Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) policies, Apple continues to pick suppliers based on their race and sex, considers race and sex in hiring and promotion decisions, employs a “VP of Inclusion & Diversity,” hosts groups for employees arbitrarily deemed “diverse” but not for others, and contributes shareholder money to organizations that advance DEI.

FEP also argues in the statement:

It’s clear that DEI poses litigation, reputational and financial risks to companies, and therefore financial risks to their shareholders, and therefore further risks to companies for not abiding by their fiduciary duties.

Despite these obvious risks, the SFFA and Muldrow decisions and the wave of corporate DEI retreats, Apple still has an “Inclusion & Diversity” program….

With 80,000 employees, Apple likely has over 50,000 who are potentially victims of this type of discrimination. If even only a fraction of employees file suit, and only some of those prove successful, the cost to Apple could reach tens of billions of dollars.

“Apple’s illegal DEI programs are dangerous, demeaning and immoral; they deny, discredit and undermine the traditional American values of hard work, excellence and individual achievement in favor of an unlawful, corrosive and pernicious identity-based spoils system,” wrote America First Legal Senior Vice President Reed D. Rubinstein in a letter to Apple’s CEO and Board of Directors last week supporting FEP’s shareholder proposal. “Apple’s shareholders understand that the company is doing wrong and risking its bottom line. Apple’s management needs to wake up and comply with the law.”

Three other proposals at the Apple meeting will also be presented by right-of-center shareholder groups advocating for a return to political neutrality. These proposals, presented by the National and Legal Policy Center, the American Family Association and Inspire Investing, address Apple’s improper use of data to train its AI projects, concerns that Apple is not adequately preventing the spread of child sex abuse materials on its platforms, and the risks arising from Apple’s charitable giving to divisive organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign (HRC).

This wave of non-woke proposals is a fresh change from years of the left outnumbering and drowning out conservative feedback at shareholder meetings.

Ethan Peck

“Clearly the tides are turning,” said FEP Deputy Director Ethan Peck. “We’re in a new era. With the Trump Administration back in charge, and with wokeness taking a massive hit in popularity, there is ample momentum to finally bring corporations back to neutral.”

Was John Deere’s walkback of DEI genuine?

On Wednesday, February 26, at the annual shareholder meeting of Deere & Company (John Deere), FEP will present Proposal 6, “Corporate Financial Sustainability Report,” which requests a report on the financial sustainability of the company’s partnerships with and charitable giving to radical and divisive organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign (HRC).

The proposal states:

Beginning on or about July 9, 2024, the Company was the object of a grassroots campaign organized by citizen-journalist Robby Starbuck claiming the Company had “gone woke” as evidenced by, among other things: “Funding a pride event for kids as young as 3,” “LGBTQ & race based identity groups at corporate,” and a “95/1002 [Corporate Equality Index] score from the [Human Rights Campaign],” which has been described as increasing the radicalization of businesses by strategically “moving the goalposts” required to obtain a good score.

On July 16, 2024, the Company, apparently in response to the public’s backlash against its “woke” policies, committed to, among other things, eliminating participation in “festivals,” and identity-based employee groups. However, the Company failed, according to Starbuck, to address all the concerns raised by the campaign. Specifically, Starbuck noted that, among other things: “Customers want to hear… they will no longer participate in social credit CEI scoring by HRC.”

FEP’s proposal is one of four proposals on the Deere ballot related to John Deere’s waffling on woke. Two proposals from the left are an attempt to reinstate John Deere’s commitment to DEI, while the proposal from the right-of-center National and Legal Policy Center aims to ensure that Deere’s retraction of DEI is not an empty promise.

“Whichever way you spin it, it’s clear that John Deere has put itself in a pickle it feels it can win,” Peck said. “This is just more proof that the company should have never adopted DEI in the first place. At this point, it would be wise for Deere to just make a clean, definitive break from DEI and not look back, instead of simultaneously trying to placate the woke, who have no limiting principle and will never be satisfied.”

FEP, the original and premier opponent of the woke takeover of American corporate life, aims to push corporations to respect their fiduciary obligations and to stay out of political and social engineering. More information about this proposal can be found in FEP’s mobile and web app, ProxyNavigator.

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