Ron DeSantis Launches Alliance With 18 Different States To Combat In opposition to Biden’s Woke ESG Agenda

Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis launched a brand new initiative with 18 different states on Thursday to struggle again towards President Joe Biden’s woke environmental, social, company governance (ESG) agenda.

The opposite states which can be becoming a member of the trouble embrace Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

A press launch from the governor’s workplace stated that ESG was “destabilizing the American economy and the global financial system.” The hassle comes after Congress handed laws to maintain politics out of the retirement funds of Americans, an effort that Biden opposed. 

“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,” the joint assertion from the states stated. “[Biden’s actions] puts the pensions of thousands of hardworking Americans at risk to the radical environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) movement, rather than prioritizing investment decisions on the highest rate of return.”

“Retirees, already suffering from the reckless fiscal policies of the Biden Administration, will continue to experience diminished returns on the investment of their hard-earned money while the corporate elite continue to use their economic power to impose policies on the country that they could not achieve at the ballot box,” the assertion continued. “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 assertion outlined the next two efforts that the states conform to struggle collectively on:

• Defending taxpayers from ESG influences throughout state methods: Amongst different actions, this may occasionally embrace blocking using ESG in all funding selections on the state and native stage, making certain that solely monetary components are thought-about to maximise the return on funding, defending retirees and taxpayers alike. This may occasionally additionally embrace eliminating consideration of ESG components by state and native governments when issuing bonds or prohibiting state fund managers from contemplating ESG components when investing taxpayer cash.
• Defending residents from ESG influences within the monetary sector: Amongst different actions, this may occasionally embrace banning the monetary sector from contemplating so known as “Social Credit Scores” in banking and lending practices aimed to stop residents from acquiring monetary providers like loans, traces of credit score, and financial institution accounts. This may occasionally additionally embrace stopping monetary establishments from discriminating towards clients for his or her spiritual, political, or social beliefs, corresponding to proudly owning a firearm, securing the border, or growing our power independence.

DeSantis stated in a press release that he gave the directive to struggle towards “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,” he added. “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.”