OAN Brooke Mallory
UPDATED 11:57 AM – Thursday, March 16, 2023
Governor Ron DeSantis has made an announcement regarding an official alliance with 18 other states to repel President Joe Biden’s advocacy for “ESG” on Thursday.
ESG stands for environmental, social, and corporate governance testing. It is used by investors to determine which bonds or stocks they should purchase.
Supporters of environmental, social, and corporate governance testing like Biden and his administration insisted that the framework helps companies shift to more sustainable activities and that ESG ratings also reveal how companies are moderating risk.
Engineering, manufacturing, construction, and architecture are typically associated with 60% of carbon-dioxide emissions, which is a concerning factor for the groups in support of ESG.
The states and governors opposing ESG claimed that they wanted to ‘protect individuals from the movement that threatens the vitality of the American economy.’
The Senate passed a disapproval resolution in early March in order to end the Department of Labor ruling that encourages investors to entertain the idea of ESG when making investment choices.
Senators Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Jon Tester (D-Mont.) also allied with Senate Republicans in support of voting for the resolution.
The complete list of governors who joined together to form an alliance came from states like Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Alabama, Alaska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming.
They described this effort as a way to push back against using American retirement funds for “woke” investments.
“The proliferation of ESG throughout America is a direct threat to the American economy, individual economic freedom, and our way of life, putting investment decisions in the hands of the woke mob to bypass the ballot box and inject political ideology into investment decisions, corporate governance, and the everyday economy,” the joined states asserted.
The resolution was sent back to Biden’s desk after passing in the House and Senate, but the White House guaranteed that the president would veto the bill.
“Yet again, President Biden put his political agenda above the wellbeing and individual freedoms of hardworking Americans… We as freedom loving states can work together and leverage our state pension funds to force change in how major asset managers invest the money of hardworking Americans, ensuring corporations are focused on maximizing shareholder value, rather than the proliferation of woke ideology,” said the governors.
Governor Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) took charge as a leading force in the push back against ESG investing, leading the 18 states in their resistance against the Biden administration’s “woke” agenda. He released a statement.
“At my direction, Florida has led the way in combatting the pernicious effects of the ESG regime by directing our state pension fund managers to reject ESG and instead focus on obtaining the highest return on investment for Florida’s taxpayers and retirees… At the time I said we would spearhead an initiative to join with other like-minded states to send an even louder message to the financial industry that the American people have rejected ESG at the ballot box, and ideologues cannot and should not circumnavigate the will of the people. Today, we have delivered on that promise. Florida has emerged as America’s economic engine, with an unemployment rate consistently lower than the nation’s and the highest rate of business formations of any other state. We will not stand idly by as the stability of our country’s economy is threatened by woke executives who put their political agenda ahead of their clients’ finances,” said DeSantis.
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