ESG has just been kept under the radar until the time is right.

Social activism among corporate elites isn’t going away, but the Trump administration and the Securities and Exchange Commission have a solution to curb the influence of Wall Street’s largest asset managers, a conservative policy group argues.

The Bull Moose Project says that, in the past, the investment firms BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street amassed significant control over shareholder votes through their dominance of passive index funds and used that influence to advance environmental, social, and governance initiatives and diversity, equity, and inclusion policies while wielding outsized power through shareholder proxy voting. However, the group contends that current decision makers at these investment firms are likely to steer these initiatives in the future if they remain in positions of influence.

“Many executives at these firms are major Democratic donors, and that’s their right. They may be cozying up to the current administration. But ESG hasn’t gone away,” Aiden Buzzetti, president of The Bull Moose Foundation, told the Daily Signal.

BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street not only wield substantial influence over the outcomes of shareholder votes but, according to the Bull Moose Project’s report, these three firms collectively own roughly one-quarter of the U.S. stock market and serve as the single largest shareholder in approximately 90% of S&P 500 companies.

All of the Big Three asset manager companies, the report says, have stewardship teams that decide how to vote on shareholder proposals, including those involving ESG initiatives, DEI policies, and other ideologically charged corporate issues.

After Trump was re-elected, BlackRock began renaming its environmental, social and governance (ESG) calling it transition investing. However, when it comes to ESG, BlackRock is its primary advocate and the company’s CEO, Larry Fink, is a true believer resulting from his commitment to the cause.

When one of the Left’s ploys is identified, opposed, and defeated, they change tactics and continue on. There were signs of DEI’s rebrand as evidenced by this Bloomberg article published two years.

Schemes, like DEI and ESG, became too costly for the Left to defend so they were changed in order to hide them. It is time to drag the Left’s cultural weapons back up into the spotlight, and obliterate them for good.

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