The SEC’s Proposal To Suppress Shareholder Votes is Awful — Here’s Why

The SEC has proposed two appalling new rules which would suppress shareholder votes and access to the sole source of independent information on subjects like out-of-control CEO pay and climate change denial. These rules are being supported by corporate insiders through a bunch of dark money front groups masquerading as public interest advocates. One of the most outrageous efforts involved a YouTube video from a Republican operative who fails to disclose that she is getting paid, much less who is paying her, and who makes up ridiculous lies about the links between this rulemaking and the big three topics guaranteed to rile the base.

This may seem in the weeds and arcane to people who are not immersed in this world. But here is why the one percent think it is worth diverting millions of corporate dollars that should be spent on worker salaries and developing better products to a massive lobbying campaign that is contrary to the interests of shareholders, employees, and consumers: CEOs are furious that there is one source of information and oversight that they cannot control. When some shareholder proposals on pay and climate change got substantial votes — EVEN THOUGH THOSE VOTES ARE SYMBOLIC ONLY AND CANNOT FORCE THE COMPANIES TO CHANGE ANYTHING — they went nuts. And so they got the three Republican Commissioners on the SEC to…