RCI's Guide to Politicized Capitalism: Promoting Liberal or Woke Causes

Part of RealClearInvestigations' Guide 
to Politicized Capitalism 
(Home page and overview here)

On This Page: Notable Examples of Corporate Activism
Promoting Progressive Causes, by Issue
(See also: Unwoke Corporations)

Racial Justice & Policing

In the wake of America’s widespread racial protests in the summer of 2020, corporations and business interests looked to demonstrate their solidarity with racial justice activists. Here is a list of resources cataloguing and ranking those efforts:

• REFINITIV Diversity and Inclusion Indices: Ranks over 11,000 companies globally, identifying “the top 100 publicly traded companies with the most diverse and inclusive workplaces, as measured by 24 separate metrics across 4 key pillars.”
• The Plug Tech company database: Database of statements made by prominent tech companies on racial justice, Black Lives Matter, and the killing of George Floyd.
• Corporate America’s $50 billion promise: The Washington Post’s follow-the-money analysis on funds pledged to racial justice during and after the summer of 2020.
• JUST Capital’s Corporate Racial Equity Tracker: Database of the commitments and actions announced by the 100 largest U.S. employers, through 23 metrics across six specific dimensions of racial equity:
  • Anti-Discrimination Policies
  • Pay Equity
  • Racial/Ethnic Diversity Data
  • Education and Training Programs
  • Response to Mass Incarceration
  • Community Investments
• Business Roundtable policing reform recommendations: Its members include chief executive officers leading companies with 20 million employees and more than $9 trillion in annual revenues.
• Corporate support for racial preferences in education: Several dozen major companies filed an amicus brief in defense of affirmative action in a Supreme Court case set to be ruled on in 2023 (see signatories on pages 46-47).

Related: Activist and journalist Christopher F. Rufo of the Manhattan Institute has produced a series of exposés critically covering anti-racist efforts undertaken by a number of major corporations.

Abortion

In the wake of the Dobbs Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade and sending questions of abortion back to the states, many companies have engaged in pro-abortion activism. Here are some relevant resources:

• Major businesses undertaking pro-abortion initiatives (2022): Newsbusters has compiled a list of 40 companies vowing to cover employees’ abortion-related travel costs following the Dobbs ruling. (In contributing to Republican causes historically, several of these major corporations are vulnerable to accusations of acting hypocritically. See for example this analysis.)
• Opposition to Indiana’s abortion restrictions (2022): Pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and engine manufacturer Cummins both condemned Indiana’s ban on abortions after 10 weeks, claiming it will hurt their ability to attract new talent.
• Opposition to Texas’ “Fetal Heartbeat Law” (2021-22): Before Dobbs, several corporations vowed to combat Texas’ “Fetal Heartbeat” legislation, passed in 2021, and related laws in other states:
  
  • Dating app Bumble created a relief fund for Texans seeking abortions in the state.
  • Cloud-based software company Salesforce offered to relocate employees.
  • Ride-share companies Lyft and Uber said they would cover legal costs for drivers transporting women to clinics to receive abortions.
  • The chief executive of Match Group – which operates online dating sites Match.com, OKCupid, and Tinder – created a fund to support employees affected by Texas’ legislation.
• Opposition to Georgia’s “Fetal Heartbeat” legislation (2019-22): Even before Dobbs, entertainment industry companies and individuals protested Georgia’s 2019 “Fetal Heartbeat” law. A federal judge blocked the legislation from taking effect – only to be overruled on appeal in July 2022 following the Dobbs decision.

LGBTQ Issues

While public displays of solidarity with LGBTQ causes are common, as reflected in major corporations’ rainbow-themed Pride Month social media icons, some companies have engaged in more confrontational – and partisan – types of political activism:

• Opposition to purported anti-LGBTQ legislation in Indiana and other states (2022): More than 150 major U.S. companies signed a letter “vocally opposing anti-LGBTQ+ legislation in Indiana and across the country – highlighting a wave of legislation targeting transgender and LGBTQ+ youth,” and expressing concern over “bills being introduced in state houses across the country that single out LGBTQ+ individuals – many specifically targeting transgender youth – for exclusion or differential treatment."
• Opposition to Trump administration efforts to narrowly define gender (2018): 56 major companies signed a letter opposing contemplated Trump administration action among federal agencies to define gender with a focus on biological sex.
• Opposition to North Carolina's transgender bathroom law (2016): 68 major companies signed onto the Human Rights Campaign’s amicus brief supporting the Obama Justice Department’s efforts to block aspects of North Carolina’s so-called “bathroom bill,” barring individuals from using public restrooms that did not match their biological sex.

Progressives counter that many of these corporations publicly express solidarity with the LGBTQ community while also contributing to politicians with antithetical views.

Resources:

• Bloomberg’s Gender-Equality Index, which “tracks the performance of public companies committed to disclosing their efforts to support gender equality through policy development, representation, and transparency.”
• Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality Index, a “national benchmarking tool on corporate policies, practices and benefits pertinent to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer employees.”

Second Amendment

In the wake of high-profile mass shootings, some companies have taken a hostile approach to the Second Amendment. Everytown for Gun Safety has a repository of business and corporate leaders who are “taking a stand on gun violence.”

Immigration

Under the Trump administration, technology companies opposed a variety of policies aimed at restricting immigration:

• Opposition to “public charge” rule (2020): More than 100 technology companies filed an amicus brief opposing President Trump’s “public charge” rules, which allowed immigration officers to use an immigrant’s current or likely future reliance on public assistance in determining whether to accept or reject their immigration application.
• Opposition to so-called Muslim travel ban (2017): In the wake of the Trump administration’s 2017 immigration executive order temporarily barring travel from a several countries, more than 100 corporations filed an amicus brief opposing the policy. Some 162 companies would submit an amicus brief challenging a revised version of the order as well.

Major corporations have continued to champion similar causes in the Biden era:

• Support for “Dreamers” (2022): In the wake of the U.S. Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit ruling that DACA is unlawful, the Business Roundtable called for Congress to pass Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) legislation, arguing that “America is at its strongest, most innovative and most competitive when immigrants are welcomed. Dreamers—who came to the United States as children and have known only the United States as home—have lived under uncertainty and threat of removal for too long.”

Election Integrity

Time magazine reported in February 2021 that a “a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information” engaged in a “conspiracy to save the 2020 election.” Corporate America would continue these efforts in several ways:

• Halting political contributions (2021): Numerous companies froze their political contributions to legislators who refused to certify the 2020 presidential election.
• Opposing more stringent election laws (2021): After Georgia legislation aimed at addressing integrity concerns raised in the 2020 race, and amid a slew of other election law reforms being proposed around the country, corporations and individual executives signed on to an open letter in defense of “democracy.” A searchable version of signatories can be found here. Non-signatories are detailed here. The Civic Alliance of similarly disposed corporate executives who oppose “barriers” to voting can be found here.