Ex-Anheuser-Busch exec reveals how lefty investment firms pressure companies to go woke

Woke governance that has sent profits spiraling at companies like Anheuser-Busch and Target often begins with lefty investment firms pressuring them to push products their way, an ex-top Anheuser-Busch exec said.

During an appearance on Fox News’ “Jesse Watters Primetime,” Anson Frericks said behind-the-scenes politicking from firms like New York-based BlackRock and Pennsylvania-based Vanguard spur many of the controversial decisions sparking nationwide boycotts from longtime more conservative customers — such as the ill-fated Bud Light promotion with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney

He said BlackRock, Vanguard, and another firm, State Street, manage about $20 trillion in capital and use their clout to promote agenda politics being pushed on them by progressive lawmakers overseeing government pension funds that the companies profit from.

One of the firms manages California’s pension fund — the largest in the country — and California politicians can have a big say in the corporate governance and politicking of the firms they invest so heavily in, he added.

“In California, for example, they recently have mandated those large pension funds that they divest from things like fossil fuels and oil and gas, and then when Bill de Blasio, [former] mayor of New York, was there, he did the same thing,” he said.

“But they also tell BlackRock, State Street, and Vanguard if they’re going to manage their money, they have to commit to things like ESG — diversity, equity, inclusion — and adopt firm-wide commitments that they therefore then force onto all the major companies in corporate America.”

Frericks added he left his job at the St. Louis-based beer titan in part because of the way much of corporate America was acting in terms of defying public sentiment when engaging in politics.

He pointed to Atlanta, home to Coca-Cola and Delta Airlines, which became outraged after Georgia’s legislators passed election integrity laws.