The idea of “woke” environmental, social and governance (ESG) policies continues to wither away. That’s good news for the firearm and ammunition industry, which has been the focus of corporations seeking to force public policies by the might of their corporate largess. It turns out that those lofty ideals aren’t so lofty after all. They’re more of a millstone weighing them down and more corporations are ditching their ESG policies.
BlackRock, the world’s biggest asset manager, announced last week a cut for support of shareholder proposals for ESG initiatives to a low of 4.1 percent. That’s down from 6.7 percent in 2023 and 47 percent from 2020-2021.
“In our assessment, the majority of these (proposals) were over-reaching, lacked economic merit, or sought outcomes that were unlikely to promote long-term shareholder value,” said its “2024 Global Voting Spotlight” report, according to Reuters.
In other words, the global investment firm is telling their shareholders that woke ideologies don’t pay. In fact, they’re likely to cost corporations in the long run. It turns out that investors don’t want their money going to push public policies that violate the law. They want business to be about business. Public policy is best left to politicians, who voters can hold accountable at the ballot box.
Bikes and Booze
They’re not the only ones. Famed American brands are learning that woke policies don’t pay the bills. Harley-Davidson CEO Jochen Zeitz brought German ESG thinking to the American icon and now fans of the rumbling motorcycles are up in arms. A video of Zeitz from 2020 surfaced where he said, “We are trying to take on traditional capitalism and trying to redefine it.” Harley-Davidson responded quicker than the kill switch on their bikes and announced it was scaling back their ESG programs.
Jack Daniel’s, the iconic Tennessee whiskey distiller, found their own brand embroiled in ESG madness. Brown-Forman, the parent company, “pre-emptively announced” their ESG programs would be rolled back after their own corporate programs were exposed. Now that’s something I can drink to.
NSSF has been vocal and active in eliminating ESG policies that put special-interest public policy goals ahead free market enterprise. These woke policies have resulted in financial and corporate discrimination against the firearm and ammunition industry. Policies adopted by nameless and faceless corporate boardrooms in Wall Street ivory towers have purposefully discriminated against firearm-related businesses all because those boardroom executives would rather cozy up to far-left gun control groups at corporate cocktail parties instead of providing fair access to businesses that make legal products that are lawfully sold.
Leading the pack on these ESG woke policies has been corporate financial institutions, namely, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo. Each of these corporate financial institutions embarked on woke corporate policies to deny firearm businesses access to financial services unless they adopted gun control policies that exceeded the law. That includes denying them banking services if they sell modern sporting rifles (MSRs) the most popular rifle sold, standard-capacity magazines and even if they don’t refuse to sell firearms to adults under the age of 21, even though the federal law says that anyone over the age of 18 can legally purchase a long gun if they pass and FBI National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) verification.
Fighting Back
That prompted NSSF to work with state legislatures and Congress to introduce the Firearm Industry Nondiscrimination (FIND) Act. That law was passed by nine states, with Louisiana’s Gov. Jeff Landry being the most recent governor to sign the law. That was quickly followed by Louisiana’s state Treasurer John Fleming announcing that he recommended Bank of America “not be approved as an authorized fiscal agent” for state or municipal contracts because of their discriminatory policies against firearm businesses, among other politically incurred industries.
Bank of America actually blinked in their standoff of holding to their gun control ESG policies in June. Bank of America felt the financial consequences of its gun control agenda when they found themselves shut out of state contracts, particularly in Texas and Florida, especially after Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed an anti-ESG law in 2023 that bars state officials from investing public money to promote woke initiatives like banking discrimination against the firearm industry.
Florida has taken a strong stand against so-called ESG because it is bad for the economy, bad for freedom, and bad for constitutional accountability.
We will take action as needed to ensure the protections we’ve enacted against ESG are honored. pic.twitter.com/kmxuixMIO4
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) January 31, 2024
Gov. DeSantis promised in an X post that he would ensure the state enforces the law against woke banking discrimination. Bank of America announced it led to firearm companies on a case-by-case basis with “enhanced due diligence” according to the bank’s latest Environmental and Social Risk Policy (ESRP). Any tangible change in policy has yet to be seen.
The federal NSSF-supported FIND Act is awaiting action in Congress. Introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Congressman Jack Bergman (R-Mich.) as H.R. 53 with 128 co-sponsors and by U.S. Sen. Steve Daines in the Senate as S. 428 with 17 co-sponsors, the bill would bar any corporate entity that holds discriminatory policies against the firearm industry from competing for federal contracts.
Those bills are in addition to the NSSF-supported Fair Access to Banking Act, introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.) as H.R. 2743 with 109 co-sponsors and the Senate by Sen. Kevin Cramer as S. 293 with 36 co-sponsors. The Fair Access to Banking Act would stop corporate banks from picking winners and losers based on executives’ personal politics. It also protects banks from outside pressure by special interest groups seeking to use the banks as a political weapon to advance their agenda.
Corporations are learning, albeit very slowly, that going woke means “going broke.” If corporations won’t listen to investors that discriminatory ESG policies don’t make sense – and don’t add up the cents – it’s time from Congress to follow the lead of several states that have stepped in to put an end to these discriminatory policies against the firearm and ammunition industry.
Larry Keane is SVP for Government and Public Affairs, Assistant Secretary and General Counsel of the National Shooting Sports Foundation.
ESG is yet another way to fleece the American consumer. I just did a quick google search on ESG and found many different websites that want to guide companies through the myriad reporting metrics and regulations. WTF??? Report to who? What regulations? As far as I know, there are no federal mandates for any of this. All I see is increased costs to the affected organizations that then pass that cost to the consumer. With no upside for the consumer, most of whom are only concerned with cost, why do they bow to the altar of the blue haired Karens?
“As far as I know, there are no federal mandates for any of this.”
And, you would be correct.
“myriad reporting metrics and regulations.” are those their centralized commissars create (the U.N. from where this originates).
ESG was a creation of the United Nations in 2004 through a joint initiative of financial institutions as a “corporate social responsibility initiative”. By 2023 its a global thing with more than $30 trillion (in U.S. dollars) in assets under management. Its part of the UN 2030 sustainable development goals (SDGs), which incorporates other plans to reach a state where there is an overarching central world authority (the U.N.) and individual rights are replaced by ‘social responsibilities’ decided by the majority – to meet the U.N. 17 SDGs. Or in other words, its plans for a docile compliant population that serves the needs of the state where the majority and ruling elite benefit and those not the majority or ruling elite serve – better known as the concept of ‘marxist socialism’ but on a grander global scale.
environmental, social and governance (ESG) policies are just another version of DEI but instead of being just ‘corporation employee’ centric they are intended to exert corporation product and supply and financial power to make others outside the corporation comply with what is really DEI in a ‘financial’ form.
And ‘Diversity-Equity-Inclusion’ (AKA DEI) are just another name for a ‘Marxists socialism’ concept, or in other words a ‘communism’.
First, lets begin with ‘Equity’: Equity is the goal of all DEI programs, which is to say that DEI programs exist to force/coerce captive audiences of people to achieve “equitable” redistribution of resources, status, and wealth according to neo-Marxist Identity Theories like Critical Race Theory.
Next, ‘Diversity’: Diversity initiatives are rooted in the goal of installing (placing, enacting) ideologically consistent ‘political officers’ (or people) within organizations to effect and enforce policies directed toward achieving equity. These political officers, often called “Diversity Officers,” (but may be known included under other titles such as ‘human resources’) are in fact a rebranding of the older concept of commissars, who enforced socialism in the same way.
Finally, ‘Inclusion’: Inclusion is an overarching value structure for the “Diverse and Equitable” commissar system that’s being installed. In fact, it’s a justification not for inclusion as most people understand it, but for censorship and purges, just like in any Communist state. Inclusion, and its extension in “Belonging,” are a manipulative strategy akin to Mao Zedong’s “unity, criticism, unity” formula for taking over not just institutions but the value structure of populations and bending them toward socialism (e.g. communism or, in this case, called by the deceptive term ‘equity’).
ESG is no different in the intent and structure – the end goal is ‘comply and if you don’t we will marginalize or eliminate you’. For ESG its the denial of products or services for businesses thus weakening them to marginalize or eliminate them. For people its the denial of opportunity or promotion or employment or rights or purchasing power and in that way they are marginalized or eliminated.
““We are trying to take on traditional capitalism and trying to redefine it.” Harley-Davidson responded quicker than the kill switch on their bikes and announced it was scaling back their ESG programs.”
No, they are most certainly no dropping it, they are scrubbing their websites of references but keeping the same ‘programs’ under new names.
Jeremy at the YouTube channel ‘The Quartering’ has the details. It’s like when they changed the name of ‘Gun Control’ to ‘Gun Safety’ trying to fool everyone its really something different.
Fortunately, there are Americans in those companies blowing the whistle on this bullshit…
“Harley Davidson BUSTED LYING About Ending Woke DEI & Jack Daniels Too!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADd8687wjJ0