Elon Musk is a pioneer in the world of business and innovation, but he’s proving to be a major force for positive cultural change in America — that is, if you love ‘traditional’ American founding principles of equality, freedom, and liberty.
In recent weeks the SpaceX and Tesla founder and CEO has made a play for Twitter, first taking on the platform’s grotesque censorship of conservative and libertarian figures and ideals before buying into the platform and, for a time, becoming its largest shareholder. After turning down a position to be on Twitter’s board of directors, Musk on Thursday made a bid to buy the company outright, offering to pay well above current share prices.
Well, it looks like that offer has been rejected, with reports noting that the company’s board unanimously adopted a “poison pill” measure to make the stock less attractive for the short term to prevent it from being bought by a singular investor named ‘Musk.’
However, Musk’s foray into Twitter has sparked a movement of sorts as conservative-leaning shareholders in other companies are now making moves to obtain more stock in a bid to water down “woke” executive boards that are making company decisions based on far-left priorities and in the best interests of investors.
The Washington Times reports:
Conservative investors are becoming shareholder activists to battle what they call the “woke” gender and race policies of America’s corporate boardrooms.
The American Legislative Exchange Council, a network of conservative private investors and state legislators, recently introduced model legislation that would stop state pension fund managers from introducing “woke criteria” into the investment selection process.
The National Center for Public Policy Research, a conservative tank in Washington, is telling moderate and conservative investors how to use shareholder proxies to challenge liberal policies in corporate board elections.
The center’s Free Enterprise Project has purchased shares in corporations such as the Walt Disney Co., which it says has allowed conservative proxies to introduce proposals against “woke” ideology at more than 100 shareholder meetings over the past four years.
“Conservative activism is finally beginning to counterbalance progressive activism on issues like identity politics and climate change goals,” said Richard Morrison, a senior fellow at the libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute.
The Free Enterprise Project last week published a guide called “Balancing the Boardroom: How Conservatives Can Combat Corporate Wokeness” for investors who are serious about pushing back on the far-left policies being adopted by companies such as Walmart and Disney.
“For decades, the left was synonymous with counterculture. Today, it is the culture,” the guide noted. “So if we are to learn anything from leftists, to their credit it’s that counterculture done right can be an effective strategy.”
The guide goes on to advise conservative shareholders to “vote against every board member” of Nike, Amazon, Disney, Twitter, Apple, Walmart, Microsoft and other major companies.
In addition, the guide asks right-leaning shareholders to vote against a dozen specific board members including former Vice President Al Gore, who is on Apple’s board.
“Vote against these directors, and then join us in constantly reminding these companies that we sensible people of the center-right will not rest until their companies have returned to making products … and otherwise staying well away from political and social discord,” Scott Shepard, a co-author of the guide, said in a statement.
This is brilliant.
