A deep dive into the WOKE 'deep state'
A deep dive into the WOKE 'deep state'
How Ohio and Florida 'DEEP STATES', Glass Lewis, implement woke ESG
As Americans awaken to the colossal danger ESG poses to our republic, conservative governors and state treasurers are taking on the issue head-on. By using working to ensure their states’ investment funds aren’t supporting woke corporations, they are doing serious damage to the woke agenda.
But the woke don’t sleep. In an all too familiar story in American politics, state bureaucrats and corporations are undermining and sabotaging those efforts. One extremely powerful but little-known firm called Glass Lewis in particular is working with lower-level officials at state funds who are either in on the woke agenda or too ignorant to notice what’s going on.
Take Ohio for example; a solid conservate state with a state government openly opposed to ESG. Yet, as our investigation, published by The Daily Wire, has shown, there is a pattern at Ohio Public Employees Retirement System (OPERS) of woke voting at shareholder meetings.
In May, OPERS voted for a "political congruency" resolution at an AT&T annual meeting that attacked pro-life lawmakers and worked to keep AT&T from working with those lawmakers. The resolution OPERS voted for complained that “AT&T and its employee PACs made political donations totaling at least $16.4 million to politicians and political organizations working to weaken women’s access to reproductive health care."
In May, OPERS voted for a resolution at the Home Depot annual meeting which attacked corporate leadership for the crime of supporting the police, specifically leveling an attack at their leadership because, "Home Depot has donated to police foundations in Detroit and Atlanta, where a Home Depot vice president sits on the board of trustees."
OPERS also voted for a “gender and racial pay equity report” at Disney, a “net zero emissions analysis” at ExxonMobil, and the issuance of a “racial equity audit” at Home Depot.
Let’s take a look at another conservative state, whose governor has championed the fight against ESG tyranny: the state of Florida.
Gov. Ron DeSantis has taken repeated actions to ensure that Florida’s State Board of Administration fund is free of ESG considerations. Yet staff at the board appear to be ignoring his explicit instructions.
At Boeing, on April 18, 2023, Florida voted for a “median gender and racial pay equity report” that would empower racially conscious human resources staff to impose hiring quotas.
At UPS, on May 4, 2023, Florida voted for a “Diversity and Inclusion” report requested by the leftist group As You Sow that would similarly empower race conscious hiring officers.
At Berkshire Hathaway on May 6, 2023 Florida voted for two climate change resolutions. The first resolution, offered by the nation’s leading woke pension fund CalPERS, excoriated the company for not being in league with the radical anti-fossil fuel Climate 100 group.
AAF has released a full memo listing these woke votes here:
Both these states are contracted with Glass Lewis, who appear to be working with state bureaucrats to take these votes.
Like most large investment funds, states hire a “proxy advisory firm” like Glass Lewis to guide them. They need to vote on around 30,000 resolutions at the shareholder meetings of the hundreds of firms the state is invested in, so hiring a firm to advise them isn’t unreasonable or uncommon.
But Glass Lewis doesn’t only focus on financial matters. As an in-depth investigation by AAF revealed, Glass Lewis has a political agenda too.
Led by a CEO who donated to former Democrat presidential candidate Howard Dean, and a president connected to the rabidly anti-conservative activist group Human Rights Campaign, and who donated to Obama, Hillary, Nancy Pelosi, and others, Glass Lewis openly embraces the principles of woke ESG investing. With Leftist ideas hard to implement through elections - given how odious these ideas are to most Americans, the woke elite are trying to implement their goals through corporate power, and Glass Lewis is all for it.
Glass Lewis tells the state pensions how to vote, and the ignorant, incompetent, or complicit state bureaucrats running the voting are obeying.
To fully push back against ESG, states need to take a serious look at finding objective advisors for their investment funds and keeping the bureaucrats at their pension systems on a much shorter leash. Until then, conservative states will continue to find their own funds are being used to advance the woke ESG agenda.
For questions and press inquiries please email yitz@americanaccountabilityfoundation.com