I attended Apple\u2019s annual meeting several weeks ago. I saw many signs of how corporate culture is shifting away from ESG and DEI.<\/p>\n
To understand why, let\u2019s briefly discuss the basics of how people actually engage with major corporations. Shareholders who own certain thresholds of stock in a publicly-traded company have the right to place proposals on that company\u2019s ballot for consideration at the annual meeting of shareholders. This process allows shareholders not only to make their voices heard at the annual meeting, but often to discuss their concerns directly with company representatives.<\/p>\n
In past years, this process was used almost exclusively by the political left and its corporate activist allies \u2014 a typical annual meeting agenda would see a slate of proposals urging companies to divest from the oil and gas industry, perpetuate divisive \u201cdiversity\u201d policies, or issue statements on social\/political issues outside of the company\u2019s core area of focus.\u00a0<\/p>\n
And the center\/right? Missing in action, as a recent op-ed<\/a> from Oklahoma State Treasurer Todd Russ (the first red state to actually step into the shareholder engagement arena) explains:\u00a0<\/p>\n The activists pushing ESG and DEI into American corporations have been hard at work, and those tasked with defending fiduciary duty, rejecting radical activism, and championing corporate political neutrality have been blind to it.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n For years, we lost the corporate engagement war on two fronts: (1) allowing the activism that exists in this space to continue unchecked, and (2) never forging a positive vision of what engaging with companies looks like for people who want those companies out of politics.<\/p>\n But now, slowly, the fortunes of war are changing. And that takes us to Apple.<\/p>\n In past years, the agenda at Apple\u2019s annual meeting has been controlled by pro-ESG activists. A glance at agendas<\/a> from the years leading up to 2023 reveals proposals asking the company to release unadjusted pay gap data based on race and gender (the lack of adjustment<\/a> can give the appearance of systemic pay inequality when it doesn\u2019t actually exist) and pressuring the company to reincorporate as a \u201csocial purpose corporation.\u201d In 2024, the shareholder agenda<\/a> was almost evenly split between pro-ESG and anti-ESG proposals.<\/p>\n But the company\u2019s 2025 meeting took place several weeks ago \u2014 without a single pro-ESG proposal on the ballot<\/a>. The four proposals before Apple shareholders were all from ESG\/DEI skeptical groups: American Family Association (filed by my firm, Bowyer Research<\/a>), asked the company to square its lax approach to combating child pornography on its platform with its commitments to user privacy and free speech. Besides our proposal, the National Legal and Policy Center urged<\/a> Apple to conduct analysis on the greatest reputational and ethical risks of the company\u2019s use of AI. The National Center for Public Policy Research<\/a> asked Apple to officially terminate its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts. And Inspire Investing petitioned Apple to justify its charitable giving to, and partnerships with<\/a>, divisive organizations like the Human Rights Campaign (which is currently pushing<\/a> companies to provide puberty blockers to children as part of their health coverage).<\/p>\n Let\u2019s be clear: although these proposals didn\u2019t pass (relatively few shareholder proposals do), this is a major win. Pro-fiduciary<\/a> actors have gone from zero representation on corporate ballots to quite literally setting the entire agenda for shareholders \u2014 in less than five years. Furthermore, several shareholder proposals got historic levels of support \u2014 an incredibly difficult feat when you realize that most proxy advisors<\/a> (organizations that control the votes of many Apple shareholders) maintain hardline opposition to any proposals aimed at true fiduciary duty and political neutrality.<\/p>\n The company seems to want to pretend that such shareholder concerns don\u2019t exist. But even there, Apple is setting the ground for a potential rollback of its current approach to DEI. CEO Tim Cook admitted that the company \u201cmay need to make some changes\u201d to its DEI approach. No kidding \u2014 when Apple\u2019s entire shareholder agenda is being set by non-ESG-aligned groups, change is the rational response.<\/p>\n The activist dominance<\/a> that locked in ESG and DEI at America\u2019s biggest companies years ago is rapidly diminishing. Pro-shareholder actors, ranging from individual investors to multi-billion dollar state pension funds<\/a>, are stepping into the corporate engagement world, with more joining every day. Per a recent release<\/a> from the Heritage Foundation, a new member of this pro-shareholder coalition, \u201cAmericans have woken up to the reality that their pensions, savings, and investments are being used to push corporate agendas that don\u2019t align with their values\u2026 Those who continue to embrace these divisive and discriminatory practices will ultimately face economic consequences.\u201d A recent article<\/a> in Harvard Law School\u2019s Forum on Corporate Governance<\/em> reported that \u201cthe data does suggest that the anti-ESG movement will continue on and maintain a strong presence in shareholder meetings while possibly expanding reach in the coming years.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s no small feat \u2014 it\u2019s a complete shift in momentum. Right-of-center shareholders are realizing how much leverage they\u2019ve been leaving on the table \u2014 and it\u2019s been paying off at a variety of major companies, from Chase<\/a> to PepsiCo<\/a>. As a corporate engagement professional, I\u2019ll tell you this is a turning point. Companies that claim their leftward drift is a result of only hearing from one side of the political aisle now have to contend with hearing from shareholders of diverse political viewpoints \u2014 a key pressure point when it comes to staying politically neutral.\u00a0<\/p>\n The activist class that pushes for ESG, DEI, and biased corporate policies now has to contend with their worst nightmares: shareholders who want businesses to focus on business, not politics. A growing infrastructure is committed to maximizing pro-fiduciary influence at America\u2019s biggest companies, and the political space is incredibly ripe for this action. Apple is only the beginning.<\/p>\n The post I Attended Apple\u2019s Annual Meeting. It Was a Turning Point Against ESG and DEI<\/a> was first published by the American Institute for Economic Research (AIER)<\/a>, and is republished here with permission. Please support their efforts.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I attended Apple\u2019s annual meeting several weeks ago. I saw many signs of how corporate culture is shifting away from ESG and DEI. To understand why, let\u2019s briefly discuss the basics of how people actually engage with major corporations. Shareholders who own certain thresholds of stock in a publicly-traded company have the right to place …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":437,"featured_media":2324418,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2391523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2391523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/437"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2391523"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2391523\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2391524,"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2391523\/revisions\/2391524"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2324418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2391523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2391523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/monetizemail.com\/magatoon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2391523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n