Support Builds for Reversing Trump’s Limits on ESG Investing
E&E News cites Research Fellow Richard Morrison’s DOL letter on pension funds and ESG investing:
To be sure, there will be detractors. Conservative and industry groups including the Competitive Enterprise Institute, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers and Western Energy Alliance were among those that supported the Trump-era rules on the grounds that investment managers should focus purely on financial returns — not social or environmental concerns.
Doing so, they argued, risks politicizing Americans’ retirement funds and creating conflicts of interest between increasingly climate-concerned finance firms and the future retirees they serve.
CEI’s stance hasn’t shifted since.
“If members of the 117th Congress (or any future one) wants to amend the work of the 93rd Congress to explicitly allow pension fund fiduciaries to promote climate change and other ESG topics, they are free to do so,” the group’s comment letter says.
“Until that time, however, the non-pension related political goals of the current administration are not a reasonable or proper base for a new rule under the statute.”