A New Axis of Evil

Ladies and gentlemen, the new axis of evil, Soros, Schwab, and Fink. Please welcome Senior Visiting Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, Andrew Puzder, Oklahoma Speaker of the House, Charles McCall, and your moderator, host of Spicer and Company, Sean Spicer. It's great to see you all. It's good to be back in our nation's capital as opposed to out. Nice that COVID is finally over, according to everyone in the government. So here's what I want to start with. There's been this new word or acronym that's kind of come into the lexicon, ESG. I want to know, Andy, I want to start with you. You ran a big company, Carl's, or CKE, which includes Carl's Jr. and several other restaurants. When did this – when and why did this come into society? Well, I would say good news for me, it came in about 2016, 2017 with any kind of force because that was the year I retired, so I didn't really have to deal with it. But it really came in about then, right around the time of the Paris Climate Accord, where corporations started to get pressure from above, and above would be their shareholders, and in this case, companies like BlackRock, State Street, Vanguard, which are trillion-dollar private investment firms. They manage funds. They manage monies for pension funds, for state pension funds, private pension funds. They manage 401K plans. And literally, BlackRock, State Street, and Vanguard combined are the largest shareholder in 80% of the companies in the S&P 500. BlackRock alone would be the largest, first, second, or third largest shareholder in those companies. So they adopted this ESG, environmental, social, and governance policy, where you invest not based on a company's financial performance, but based on how well they are accomplishing these leftist progressive goals. But just to be clear, it came from shareholders, not employees. That's where this largely got driven from? Yeah, it started with these large investment firms shoving these policies down on the companies in which they invested. And if you're the CEO of a company, you answer to the board, and the board is elected by the shareholders. So they're all very conscious of what these large shareholders will do. They went after Exxon. They actually put three environmentalists on the board of Exxon. Within a few months, Exxon had a net-zero carbon emissions policy. Now, does anybody out there think that Exxon having a net-zero carbon emissions policy is in its financial interest or the interest of its shareholders? You have to be an idiot to think that. Well, this is exactly what the left has been selling and fairly effectively. All right. So, Mr. Speaker, you're the longest-serving speaker in Oklahoma history, correct? That's correct. All right. That's the easy question. From your perspective, when did this come in to sort of the legislative process? About the same time? And was it the leftist legislators reacting the same way, or what drove them to sort of start to incorporate this into the legislative process, even in a state like Oklahoma? We recognized this as an emerging problem last year and started developing legislation to protect our pensions in the state of Oklahoma in terms of the hard-earned money from state employees that has been tucked away for a retirement, and a retirement that they can actually live on. We looked at these ESG funds. They underperformed the S&P 500, yet a lot of the pension monies are trying to be seized and directed to these underperforming funds, all based upon an ideology that we want to direct money to entities that support our social political agenda, which is not in the best interest of the beneficiaries of these pensions. And so we started looking at the state level in terms of what can we do, how can we protect the citizens of our state, and how can we collaborate with other states across the country to put in safeguards to ensure that when it comes to investing the pension funds of the state, that we are seeking the highest return for those beneficiaries. So let me kind of ask, let me twist this the way I ask Andy. Do you think it's the legislators driving the train, or is it constituents telling the legislators that they want this done? Right now it's the legislature. Legislators that have realized the problem. And they're responding to the leftist activists. Correct. Absolutely. ESG is just purely political activism, and it undermines the financial returns and the focus of the fiduciary duty that all of our pension administrators have to seek out the highest return for the beneficiaries of the pensions. So Andy, I own a handful of stocks, right, and in the mail I get an envelope every once in a while that tells me that the annual meeting is coming up. In years past I've just thrown it away. I get it. I'm not going to the annual meeting. I really don't care. I own five shares of whatever company. Who cares? Should I check those boxes? Should I look through and see what's being voted on and who the board of directors are and maybe vote against some of them? Should I take an interest in that? Everybody should take an interest in it. And there are organizations out there that will help direct you to how to vote for particular corporations. Because, you know, you've got really thousands of corporations, and everyone has probably five to ten directors, and there will be shareholder resolutions. And the left is very good at framing shareholder resolutions so they sound like they're doing exactly the opposite of what they're doing. So you really do need guidance and you need to be able to read these things carefully. But voting, how your shares are voted is important. If you have a financial advisor, tell your financial advisor you don't want these investment firms voting your shares. You want to vote your shares because if you have a mutual fund or a 401K or an index fund investment like you invested in the S&P or something, these funds like BlackRock, State Street, and Vanguard are using your money to accomplish leftist political goals that you don't support, which is the genius of ESG. They use other people's money to accomplish these progressive political and social agenda items. And that's something we can all work with our financial advisors to stop. So speaking of investment and a lot of money, states invest a lot of money, right? I imagine the state of Oklahoma, your pension fund, et cetera, invests a lot of money. What is the state of Oklahoma doing to ensure that you guys are looking after it so that it's not going to ESG-type funds? We are specifically have crafted legislation that requires and defines what a fiduciary duty is. And we are confining that to the sole fiduciary duty is seeking out the highest return for pension beneficiaries in the state. You have to define, you have to take first, take on your pensions in your state. Those can be trillions of dollars that we're talking about. Secondly, you have to take on the contracts and the vendors of the state and ensuring that whoever the state is doing business with, who they elect to do business with, and the executive, that their companies do not subscribe to ESG policies. That's very important in protecting and maximizing outcomes for the state. Thirdly, you have to also empower your executive branch to go after and root out these types of systematic political activism tactics by the left, which could be making sure you empower your attorney generals in your state, the governor of your state, to have full control over the executive branch of government. In the state of Oklahoma, two years ago, we passed House Bill 1236. I was happy and excited to champion that. But every member of my Republican caucus, and we do have an 80 percent supermajority Republican stronghold in the state of Oklahoma. We're proud of that. The same percentage in the Senate. Every statewide elected official in our state is held by a Republican. But we put in a mechanism to exercise our Tenth Amendment rights as a state to push back against federal overreach and to authorize our attorney general to constitutionally fight those things in the court. But we also thought about things into the future. If political power were to change in the state of Oklahoma, God forbid, but if we had an attorney general that would not seek to push back against federal overreach, there is a provision in that bill that the legislature could seek, through vote of both chambers, to go and engage its own attorney to push back against federal overreach. So I think those are all very much things that the state has to focus on to get ahead of not just ESG, but these other types of overreach and mechanisms to try to grab power and force policy outside of the legislative process. The left is redefining the golden rule in this country. It has now become the man with the gold makes the rules. And Joe Biden wants to use your gold to make and implement his rules and his policy. And that is what we have to push back against at the state level. So, Andy, the speaker brings up this fiduciary responsibility, right? This idea that they're supposed to be looking out for your best interest, seeking the highest return. So if you're an average investor, you're sometimes investing in maybe a mutual fund or whatever. What should we know? What should we look out for? And how do we push back? Well, when I look, there's an organization called Second Vote where you can check on the political. They score, they rate companies from one to five, conservative, liberal to conservative. And I try and vote for companies that are three, fours and fives, which is neutral, leans left, leans right and right, mostly emphasizing companies that are threes, that are politically neutral, because my theory is that companies focused on profits will be more profitable than companies that don't. Crazy. It's kind of a crazy idea. But on the state legislative level, it's really wonderful what Oklahoma is doing. There are also Florida, Kentucky, West Virginia, a number of Republican states are passing legislation. There is model fiduciary duty legislation that the Heritage Foundation has out there and that the American Legislative Exchange Council has out there that make it very clear that if you're investing state funds, you're supposed to invest in the interest of the beneficiaries of those funds. And these bills specifically exclude ESG, environmental, social or governance investing. And the more states pass that, the better off we're going to be. And Oklahoma is a leader in this area, and they should be very proud of what they've done. I want to switch gears just a little bit with you, Speaker, because in the title of this is Soros. And one of the things that I find fascinating is over the last several cycles, George Soros has created this web where he has gone into state government, and whether it's secretaries of state, local attorneys, and started to help fund the elections of a lot of these organizations, a lot of these individuals. How pervasive is it really at the local and state level? It's very pervasive, even for a really red state like Oklahoma, where there's really no chance to change the legislative dynamic currently because of such high supermajorities or in the statewides. But just this past election cycle, we have seen an unprecedented amount of money coming in from the left to try to change those outcomes. And it's not just the election cycle that the leftist groups are trying to change the policy the way they want. In many states, the initiative petition mechanism through the state's constitution is being exploited to usher in questions that bypass the legislature's protection. In Oklahoma, once again, we have that supermajority that would stop all bad policy directly through its legislatures and chambers. These groups are now seeking, with just a few million dollars, they can go out and collect the signatures to get items placed on the ballot before the people and put a few more million dollars behind messaging that really deceives the people and which we've seen a few things pass that we did not think could ever pass in our state. So there's a lot of money and a lot of tactics. If it can pass in Oklahoma within 80%, then it can pass anywhere. Absolutely. Anything that's run in any state that benefits children and education, that's the message that the far left will try to pass these initiative petition state questions by. In a very short time, the people of the state realize, wow, we were deceived and we made a big mistake. Andy, I want you to put your hat back on as a Fortune 500 CEO for a second. If you were running a big company today, how would the operation of a George Soros influence your decision making today? So would the petitions of outside groups, of employees, what would be influencing your decision making or not? Well, I probably run my company a little differently than most people do today. I don't think you should be turning over the operations to your employees. They work for you, you don't work for them. Soros figured out that the real action today is at the state level. And that's hard for some people to understand because you always think it's at the federal level. But with the current situation where the Republicans have the House, the Democrats have the Senate, you really can't get much done legislatively. The real things that are being done legislatively that will have an impact on life will happen at the state level. And then when Republicans get back in power, they can work their way up to the federal level. And you control a lot. If George Soros had thought ahead back in 2000, then I don't know that George Bush would have won the election back in 2000. He might have ended up with a President Al Gore for four years or so. He's not a good person. And we shouldn't say bad things about people, but I can think of a lot of things I'd like to say about him. But he's not a stupid person either, and he's got a lot of money. And what he's done has been very insidious and very effective. Now, if you're running a corporation, you're more concerned about your customers and your shareholders. That's who you really focus on. Well, if you're dealing with employees, you're dealing with these outside forces, you're trying to do whatever you can to make them think you're doing what they want you to do. But you've really got to be concerned with your board, your shareholders, and your customers. So as customers, everybody in this room can have a tremendous impact, and not just by stopping. In other words, if, for example, AT&T drops Newsmax. They did. Yeah, right. Don't just cancel DirecTV. Call AT&T and tell them why you're canceling. You've got to get out. You have to make what you're doing known. It isn't just enough to say, I'm going to stop buying this. I'm not going to buy Coke anymore because it's woke. I'm going to buy Diet Dr. Pepper, which is better, by the way. I'm not going to buy Coke. But let Coke know why you're doing this, because that's what will impact their actions. I want to pick up on that, because I believe in the last 12 months in particular, the right and people in this room in particular who have been super active, we've gotten some wins. We've actually gotten some wins on the board where we've stood up and said no. They can't just roll over us anymore. And I guess the question is, what do you think, Speaker, has changed? Do you think that we're organized better, that there are groups that are in tune? Do you think we've just had enough? What is it? But I feel empowered more than ever before. I think people are just fed up with the current administration in Washington. And they're looking for states to take action. And, you know, we are a republic. Who do you listen to? I mean, I'm always amazed when you talk to a politician. What comes into your, you know, your phones, your e-mail, you know, what DMs do you get? What do you go, okay, I've got a problem, or I'm doing well? You know, it comes, you know, it's for us in the House of Representatives, we listen to the people that elect us in Oklahoma. We carry the priorities to our legislative session. Our legislative session is only four months every year. But we do, we are, it's a collaboration between the other conservative states in the union, too. My relationship with, let's say, Speaker Cameron Sexton in Tennessee, it's great to be able to pick up the phone, collaborate and exchange, hey, how is this affecting your state, what are you seeing, and build a coalition to move this type of, you know, pieces of legislation through to protect the people of our states. So it's a multifaceted issue, and we have to be, we have to be motivated and inspired to really not only just focus on our state to get it right, but to work with these other states to help them. And coming with ESG, we have been working to come up with model legislation, and Andrew, thank you for your input, and Senator Braun was here yesterday, I appreciate his involvement in championing this issue that, and this bill that we saw go through both the Senate and the House this week in Washington on this Department of Labor rule. We have to fight this at all levels. But in the state of Oklahoma, we have no one to blame but Republicans for not getting things done, so we are highly motivated. Every day we were in session working for the people. Andy, you touched on cancel culture a little. Let me ask you this, from a conservative standpoint, you look at a company like Disney that has gone, like, woke plus. What is your advice, I mean, you touched on it for a second, don't just cancel, call. But do you say to a parent, don't get Disney Plus, don't watch Disney movies, or do you just call Disney? I mean, what is it? Because how do we strike that balance between being active and protest? Well, the more active you are, the more effective what you're doing, it's going to mean more. If you don't go to Disneyland or Disney World for a vacation, and it's because of their woke policies, call them and tell them that. If you just don't go, it will have an effect, but it will have a much more meaningful effect if you go there. Look, Disney is aware of this. I mean, you don't offend half your target market and not realize what you're doing. I mean, they're aware that they've messed this up, and they've lost control now in Florida of the land in which Disney World stands, thanks to Governor DeSantis. He deserves a round of applause. So they're aware that they've messed this up, but the more pressure you can put on them, the easier it makes the CEO to resist the internal culture. They've made so many changes that their culture has now changed. So when you're running that company, you want to make changes. You've got to move. It's like moving the Titanic. It's not like turning a speedboat. You've got to turn the Titanic. And when you let them know that that supports what they're doing, it makes it easier for them to do it. And so do you guys think that there's a – when you mentioned talking to the Speaker of Tennessee, is there a collaboration among the states to say, hey, I know I've talked to a lot on my show with Jimmy Patronus in Florida. I mean, they've done a great job in Florida of pulling out of BlackRock and saying we're not going to let BlackRock invest our funds. Is there a collaboration among the states in saying, hey, we've had a win, look at what you guys can do? Absolutely. And when 25 states in this country make a move like that, we send a very clear message. And that changes the dynamic. But you cannot – I don't want to underscore the fact of the point that Andrew's making also. It's the people of our country also. Government can't do everything. They can't protect against everything. The people of this country have got to engage and act with your own money. And file that – make a protest vote by changing your business, whether that's Disney, whether it's the financial institution that you use, the investment company that you use. If you want to get people's attention, you have a – once again, the man with the gold makes the rules. And ultimately, that's the people of this country. I think about the instance of Goya Foods. When the CEO of Goya Foods went to see President Trump and he said something positive and they tried to cancel him. In fact, everyone went out and bought garbanzo beans just to buy him and said, screw you, we're going to support Goya and President Trump. And they were – so, I mean, that's another example of going out and voting with our pocketbooks and showing that we'll stand up for principles. But I think that gets back to this idea of we've got the ability to vote with our wallets too, just as much as the left. And if we stand up and do the right thing, that happens, right? I mean, that's the takeaway. And that's what I believe the far left is ultimately concerned and scared of. Right. The people of this country activating and making those decisions with their pocketbooks. Andy? Well, the left doesn't want a second economy, and that second economy would be an economy that's supported by conservatives. And you do start to see the widening out there now where some companies are going left, some companies are going right. The ideal world would be a Milton Friedman-ish kind of world where everybody actually just focused on making profits, generating returns for investors, doing the kinds of things companies traditionally did. It's the change, it's that emphasis on this environmental, social, and governance investment criteria that's really had a terrible effect on our economy. I'll quote Joe Manchin. He said yesterday that ESG puts politics over the interests of 150 million retirees in this country. And Manchin isn't always right, but he was right yesterday. Well, I want to thank you both for having this wonderful conversation. I think the big takeaway is we've got power. Let's be active. Let's go out there and vote with our wallets. Let's have our voices heard, and let's get things done. Thank you for being a wonderful audience and being here. Thanks, everybody. Anyway, thank you. By the way, I've got a great new book on fake news. I'll be signing it at 12 o'clock down in CPAC Central. I'll see you down there.