FREE ENTERPRISE PROJECT EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Stefan Padfield is the executive director of the National Center’s Free Enterprise Project (FEP), which is the original and premier opponent of the woke takeover of American corporate life.
FEP files shareholder resolutions, engages corporate CEOs and board members, submits public comments, engages state and federal leaders, crafts legislation, files lawsuits and directs media campaigns to push corporations to respect their fiduciary obligations and to stay out of political and social engineering.
Prior to joining FEP, Stefan spent over 15 years teaching law at the University of Akron School of Law, publishing over 15 law review articles and a book chapter. He co-authored a two-volume mini-treatise on the history of economic thought and contributed to the Business Law Prof Blog.
Stefan previously worked in private practice at Cravath, Swaine & Moore, LLP, and clerked for two federal court judges. Stefan originally emigrated to the U.S. as a child, later becoming a U.S. citizen and serving 6 years in the U.S. Army.
Stefan earned his Juris Doctorate from the University of Kansas and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Brown University.
An archive of Stefan’s scholarly papers can be found here.
FEATURED APPEARANCES
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FEATURED ARTICLES
A Question for Goldman Sachs: What Is a Woman? (RealClearMarkets, May 2025)
About That Unconscious Bias Training: It’s the Pipeline, Stupid (RealClearMarkets, April 2025)
Does the SEC Believe ‘Transing’ Kids Is Normal Business for CVS? (RealClearMarkets, April 2025)
Did Tim Cook Lie About Apple’s DEI? (InsideSources, March 2025)
Proxy Voting and the Myth About Shareholder Democracy (RealClearMarkets, March 2025)
Is Apple’s DEI Program One of the Nine Worst? (RealClearMarkets, February 2025)
No, 98% of Costco’s Shareholders Don’t Support DEI (RealClearMarkets, February 2025)
The Excuses For DEI Programs Get Worse and Worse (RealClearMarkets, January 2025)
DEI Is The Problem (RealClearMarkets, January 2025)
Prediction: Costco’s Race-Focused DEI Programs Won’t See 2026 (RealClearMarkets, January 2025)
Corporations Clinging To DEI Will Lose Social License to Operate (RealClearMarkets, December 2024)
Five Falsehoods About the Anti-ESG Movement (RealClearMarkets, December 2024)
Woke Inc. and ESG (InsideSources, October 2024)
Enhanced Scrutiny and the Omnipresent Specter of Political Bias (Columbia Law School’s CLS Blue Sky Blog, July 2024)
That Starbucks DEI Case Doesn’t Stand for What You Think It Does (Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, April 2024)
Larry Fink’s Investor Letter Ignores Elephants In BlackRock’s Room (RealClearMarkets, April 2024)
Are We Witnessing the Retreat of Woke Capital? (Human Events, April 2024)
The Shareholder Activism of Anti-Discrimination Proponents (Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, April 2024)
Shareholders Must Protect Their Voting Rights to Protect Their Profits (Newsmax, February 2024)
Asked About Its $244 Million BLM Donation, Microsoft Told Its Investors to Pound Sand (The Hill, December 2023)
Are the Big 5 Liars? (Newsmax, November 2023)
Radicalism Behind Corporate Silence to Hamas Atrocities (Newsmax, November 2023)
Nasdaq’s Absurd Diversity Rule Will Replace Women With Men Who Identify As Women to Achieve Equality for Women (The Daily Caller, October 2023)
ESG, DEI & Antisemitism (Newsmax, October 2023)
How Starbucks Avoided Accountability for Racial Discrimination (Washington Times, October 2023)
Do Asset Managers Hate Their Conservative Clients? (Newsmax, October 2023)
ESG Proponents Falsely Claim to Be Capitalists (Newsmax, September 2023)
Directors Need to Account for Reverse Discrimination (Newsmax, September 2023)
Questions Every Corporate Director Should Answer in a Post-Woke World (Enter Stage Right, September 2023)
This Labor Day, Reflect on Why ESG Is Bad for Workers (Newsmax, August 2023)
Break Up Overboarding to Break Up Woke Capitalism (Newsmax, August 2023)
The ‘Hypothetical Conflict’ That May Be at the Root of Disney’s Woes (InsideSources, August 2023)
Corporate America’s Radicalization Enabled by True Believers, Useful Idiots, Opportunists and Cowards (InsideSources, August 2023)
Is Disney Complicit in Hate Speech? (Daily Caller, July 2023)
The Pro-Fiduciary Duty Movement is Winning (Newsmax, June 2023)
Are Corporate Boards Breaching Their Fiduciary Duties by Embracing Transgenderism? (The Washington Times, June 2023)
The Duty to Monitor Diversity Training (Law & Liberty, October 19, 2020)