State Financial Officers fdn
State Financial Officers fdn // raga?
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State financial officers put Bank of America on notice for allegedly 'de-banking' conservatives
POLITICS April 18
State financial officers put Bank of America on notice for allegedly 'de-banking' conservatives
FIRST ON FOX: A group of 15 state financial officers penned a letter to Bank of America, warning it against discriminating against conservatives and religious Americans.
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- Lauren Windsor @ Zeteo: The Right’s ‘War on Woke’ Is a Cash Grab on State Treasuries
Derek Kreifels led a decade-long crusade against ‘woke’ corporations. Now, he’s getting state business for his Christian finance firm. Read Lauren Windsor’s year-long corruption investigation at Zeteo.
AN 8 26
President Donald Trump's political movement, Make America Great Again (MAGA), heavily relies on Christian nationalists who ignore the Founding Fathers' secularism to argue the United States was founded as an explicitly Christian country. Yet according to a groundbreaking new report, Christian nationalists are engaging in self-dealing on a massive scale — and through connections with American government entities.
"Ballrooms, slush funds, jumbo jets. Worship services in the Pentagon, electioneering in churches, the Ten Commandments in schools," reported Zeteo's Lauren Windsor on Wednesday based on over a year's worth of reporting. "Conflicts of interest and Christian nationalism have been hallmarks of Donald Trump’s second presidency. The epic flood of corruption swamping Washington isn’t just overwhelming American politics – it’s also obscuring the grift occurring in red states across the country, as officials work to put public investment funds under the control of their friends at Christian finance firms."
Windsor added, "A major conduit for that corruption is the State Financial Officers Foundation (SFOF), a small but powerful nonprofit that convenes Republican state treasurers and auditors, right-wing activists, and Christian finance executives to strategize over how to defeat liberals and weaponize state treasuries against allegedly woke corporations, while steering state treasury money to their ideological allies. Much of their “War on Woke” consists of boosting the fossil fuel industry and crushing efforts to mitigate climate change, under the notion that corporate safeguards are bad business."
Although Windsor's report briefly mentioned the state of affairs in Kentucky, she focused on Alaska, including a character named Derek Kreifels.
"Derek Kreifels was the CEO of the State Financial Officers Foundation for more than a decade," Windsor wrote. "He resigned from this role in the fall of 2024, but he remains an SFOF board member, and his wife serves as one of its top executives. Now, Kreifels is lobbying SFOF treasurers to put public retirees’ savings and other funds they oversee into faith-aligned financial products and services offered by his firm, Prospr Aligned, and its affiliates in the Christian finance industry."
Windsor added, "Kreifels’s firm has already won business from the Kentucky auditor’s office, which is led by a member of the State Financial Officers Foundation’s leadership team, as I can report for the first time. Another state Kreifels has targeted heavily is Alaska, where he has friends in former Revenue Commissioner and ex-SFOF Vice Chair Adam Crum and Alaska Permanent Fund Chair Jason Brune."
She also said that in an interview with her in Anchorage last year, "Brune defended Crum and his collaboration with Kreifels as efforts to promote resource extraction in the Arctic – arguing that he and Crum, as members of the governor’s cabinet, 'are pimping for the state.'"
Describing one event, Windsor reported that "in the weeks leading up to the event, SFOF honored Crum, naming him its vice chair for 2025, and Kreifels announced he was resigning as CEO to embark on a private business venture he would soon reveal.
She added, "'I have been called to a new mission,' Kreifels declared. The Anchorage summit presented great synergies for Kreifels. He could, using nonprofit money, convene right-wing finance officials and industry executives who lobby them – while lobbying those officials himself on the services offered by his new business venture and celebrating his tenure at SFOF with friends and family in an exotic locale. According to emails from Kreifels that I obtained, SFOF covered travel costs for public officials and their staff."
The State Financial Officers Foundation has also helped support Kreifels’s private business ventures. According to state travel disclosures, SFOF paid for at least one treasurer’s travel to the New York Stock Exchange launch party for Prospr’s Alaska investment fund, reports Windsor, adding that SFOF also arranged for a special speaker: longtime ally Paul Atkins, who as chairman of the Trump Securities and Exchange Commission regulates the Prospr fund."
IRS rules prohibit self-dealing and private benefit from nonprofit money, Windsor said.
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very bad code
vid coming for your guns, climate...rokita BS
bank of America accused of discriminating against conservatives
Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita and Timothy Two Project International founder Steve Curtis join "Fox & Friends First" to discuss the bombshell allegations and how the bank has responded to the accusations.
FIRST ON FOX: A group of 15 financial officers representing 13 states issued a warning to Bank of America over its alleged practices of "politicized de-banking" targeting conservatives.
In a letter to Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan, the officials said the bank's practices threaten its own financial health and reputation with customers while simultaneously harming the U.S. economy and Americans' civil liberties. They pointed to examples of Bank of America shuttering the accounts belonging to Christian groups and leaders and joining a net-zero climate alliance in addition to its poor viewpoint diversity rating.
"Americans should never have to worry that their personal financial decisions will be weaponized against them," Kentucky State Auditor Allison Ball said in a statement. "This practice has become all too common, and banks must urgently course correct to uphold their fiduciary duty and safeguard the constitutional freedoms of Americans."
She blasted executives at financial institutions for taking advantage "of the divided political climate to engage in politicized de-banking."
CHRISTIAN NONPROFIT CLAIMS IT WAS 'DE-BANKED' BY BANK OF AMERICA OVER ITS RELIGIOUS VIEWS
A Bank of America store front
"Given the large number of nonprofits we serve that are affiliated with religious organizations, it’s absurd to think religious beliefs are a factor in any account closing decision," a Bank of America spokesperson told Fox News Digital. "Very simply, they are not." (AP2013)
In one example highlighted by Ball and the other 14 officials, Bank of America in April 2023 shut down the bank account belonging to Indigenous Advance Ministries, a Christian charitable organization that assists at-risk children, prisoners and sex trafficking victims in Uganda. The bank further closed the accounts of a Memphis, Tennessee, church that donated to that group.
Bank of America explained the action was taken because of the group's "business type" and that its activities exceeded the "bank’s risk tolerance." After repeated requests for clarification from Indigenous Advance Ministries, Bank of America said the accounts were closed because a business affiliated with the group engaged in debt collection, the Christian Post newspaper reported.
GOP AGs PUT MAJOR US BANK ON NOTICE FOR ALLEGED 'DE-BANKING' OF CONSERVATIVES
According to the letter, in a similar action last year, Bank of America closed the account of Timothy Two Project International, which trains pastors in more than 65 countries. The bank reportedly informed Timothy Two Project International that it was "operating a business type we have chosen not to service."
And three years prior, Bank of America reportedly froze the accounts of Christian author and preacher Lance Wallnau for allegedly laundering money. It then unfroze his account after asking him "invasive" questions about his activities, the state officers wrote.
A photo of Brian Moynihan
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan (Drew Angerer/Getty Images/File)
The letter stated that Bank of America's actions strongly suggest that "systemic drivers of religious and political bias may be at work within the company as a whole."
The bank, though, pushed back on those accusations.
"Given the large number of nonprofits we serve that are affiliated with religious organizations, it’s absurd to think religious beliefs are a factor in any account closing decision," Bank of America spokesperson Bill Halldin told Fox News Digital. "Very simply, they are not."
NIGEL FARAGE ON HIS EFFORTS TO EXPOSE 'DE-BANKING'
The state financial officers also said Bank of America's membership in the so-called Net-Zero Banking Alliance, a global group that coordinates actions taken by banks to push a green energy transition, may facilitate de-banking. They noted that commitments made by Bank of America through its membership could greatly harm farmers in their states since it will lead to higher prices.
Kentucky State Auditor Allison Ball
Kentucky State Auditor Allison Ball (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley/File)
And the letter pointed to Bank of America's low ranking on the Viewpoint Diversity Score Business Index, a benchmark for measuring corporate respect for free speech and freedom of religion. The index found that Bank of America partners with left-wing groups like the Human Rights Campaign and the Center for American Progress when it comes to its gift-matching program but leaves out faith-based groups, instead citing its support for "homeless shelters, soup kitchens or other social service needs."
"This pattern of internal political and religious bias at Bank of America poses risks for public funds invested in the company as well as for the millions of individuals, businesses, and nonprofits who rely on its services," the letter to Moynihan states. "Bank of America’s de-banking policies and practices improperly subordinate financial well-being to other factors and place the company’s business interests at risk."
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The letter concluded by asking Bank of America to take a number of good faith steps to address the concerns, including eliminating viewpoint discrimination and exiting the Net-Zero Banking Alliance.
"Financial institutions like Bank of America should not be allowed to restrict Americans' access to capital based solely on their political or religious views. SFOF will continue to work with our members to fight for financial sanity, free of political agendas," said State Financial Officers Foundation CEO Derek Kreifels.
Thomas Catenacci is a politics writer for Fox News Digital.
Conversation 469 Comments
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SFOF Exposed
cmd armiak
In recent years, the State Financial Officers Foundation (SFOF), a group of Republican state treasurers and auditors committed to promoting “free-market, pro-growth policies,” has been weaponized by right-wing operatives and organizations to amplify a manufactured crisis around environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs that work to address the climate emergency and promote a fairer and more just society. SFOF Exposed provides an easily accessible resource for journalists, researchers, and citizen activists to identify the financial officers, operatives, groups, and funders involved in the politicized effort.
Contributors to this project include: David Armiak, Liisa Silander, Edgar Valles, Juliana Broad, Connor Gibson, Ansev Demirhan, Evan Vorpahl, and Arn Pearson.
This project was made possible with a grant from the Sunrise Project.
american-accountability-foundation
CMD
https://www.triplepundit.com/story/2022/anti-esg-office-holders/761261
the anti-ESG movement and the “woke capitalism” canard has many U.S. political observers scratching their heads. Instead of the traditional Republican Party support for big business, a growing number of Republican office holders are leveraging their legislative power against corporate efforts to align with ESG (environmental, social and governance) principles. Nevertheless, the pieces of the puzzle are beginning to come together.
The usual suspects: Fossil energy lobbyists
The anti-ESG movement focuses primarily, though not exclusively, on stemming the flow of investor dollars to the renewable firms that that are involved in clean energy and related fields.It’s no surprise, then, to find the Heartland Institute front and center in the anti-ESG movement, which it also calls “anti-woke.” The organization is well known for developing media and legislative playbooks in support of the fossil energy and tobacco industries. The organization is apparently applying the same methodology to stem the flow of investment dollars to renewable energy.
Last June, Heartland catalogued its anti-ESG playbook in a long-form article under the title, “Woke Investing Gets Well-Deserved Pushback.”
“The Heartland Institute has written extensively and testified about the dangers of government agencies mandating banks, companies, and portfolio funds adopt and report on Environment, Social, and Governance (ESG) standards,” noted the article’s author, H. Sterling Burnett.
“Heartland has also provided detailed critiques of efforts by a cabal of large, multinational banks and gigantic financial companies to force every business to adopt ESG goals,” Burnett continued.
The use of the word “cabal” is not a one-off. Burnett continues to deploy coded words that evoke the anti-Jewish canard of an all-powerful financial cult that pulls the strings of the global economy.
Editor's note: Be sure to [subscribe to our Brands Taking Stands newsletter, which comes out every Wednesday.
“The woke, billionaire corporate elites who run these corporations do this by threatening to withdraw banking or financial services or by applying pressure through their control over large amounts of a company’s stock,” he added.
Burnett also emphasized that Heartland can take partial credit for the growing number of states that have proposed or enacted anti-ESG legislation. “In a joint effort with likeminded nonprofit organizations, The Heartland Institute’s government relations professionals have pushed back against this by working with legislators in various states to shape and adopt model legislation blocking use of ESG scoring in deciding whether to offer banking and investment services. These efforts have borne fruit,” he wrote.
The other usual suspects: Trump supporters
It’s also no surprise to find investor, former Facebook board member and political kingmaker Peter Thiel involved in the anti-ESG movement. He was instrumental in former U.S. President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign for office. He also publicly backed two candidates for U.S. Senate this year, both of whom deployed anti-ESG rhetoric during their campaigns.
In addition, Thiel has launched a new financial venture that is apparently aimed at providing an outlet for anti-ESG investors.
Reporters Liz Hoffman and Charley Grant picked up that thread for the Wall Street Journal last May in an article titled, “Woke, Inc.’ Author’s Startup to Take On BlackRock” and subtitled, “Backed by Peter Thiel and Bill Ackman, Vivek Ramaswamy’s Strive will tell CEOs to stay out of politics.”
“An upstart financial firm backed by Peter Thiel and Bill Ackman has a message for American corporations: Focus on making money, not taking stands,” they observed. “Mr. Thiel invested both personally and through his Founders Fund, joined by Palantir Technologies Inc.”
“Vivek Ramaswamy, who made his fortune in pharmaceutical startups before writing a book last year called ‘Woke, Inc.,’ says he has raised $20 million to start a fund manager that would urge companies not to wade into hot-button social or environmental issues,” they added.
The idea seems to be catching on. Last August, reporters Katherine Greifeld and Elaine Chaim of Bloomberg noted that the firm filed for four more equity ETFs. “The filings land just two weeks after the Strive US Energy ETF (ticker DRLL) launched, which has already accumulated nearly$250 million in assets,” they wrote.
The anti-ESG movement embraces Elon Musk and the religious right
Another leading element in the anti-ESG movement that has recently come to light is the nonprofit organization State Financial Officers Foundation. The group reportedly claims that it is not involved in advocating for elected officials. However, its financial “team” is staffed exclusively with Republicans, many of whom hold elected office, according to research by David Armiak of the Center for Media and Democracy. At least four members of the group are elected officials in Texas, West Virginia, Arizona and Kentucky who are known for promoting anti-ESG policies.
Nonpartisan or not, the Foundation has advocated on behalf of the fossil energy industry, as expressed in a public letter to President Joe Biden last April. It has also publicly aligned itself with high-profile personalities and organizations in the anti-ESG movement.
On Tuesday, for example, the organization’s home page featured a tweet from newly minted Twitter owner Elon Musk that read, “ESG is the devil.”The brief message is of a piece with Musk’s earlier anti-ESG pronouncements, as reported by the New York Times.
The day before that, the Foundation's home page highlighted a tweet from the Washington Stand, a publication of the Family Research Council, an evangelical activist group. The tweet linked to an unattributed commentary that described a Foundation conference in November, in which “conservative leaders made it clear that, moving forward, they plan to be woke capital’s worst nightmare,” the Family Research Council wrote.
As with other anti-ESG manifests, the piece leveraged anti-Jewish sentiment by repeatedly focusing attention on the financial firm BlackRock and its Jewish CEO.
Advertisers are already bailing from Twitter on account of Musk’s tolerance for hate speech on his platform. Issues related to his other business ventures may also come into play. Now that the anti-ESG movement has embraced his rhetoric, the likelihood of additional advertisers fleeing from Twitter has grown.
As for the State Financial Officers Foundation, its embrace of Musk’s “free speech” policy should be a red flag to any remaining corporate sponsors and donors that continue to support the organization, and a clear signal that business leaders can no longer count on the safe haven of Republican policy-making to support their interests.
omg
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/05/climate/republican-treasurers-climate-change.html
no lnx
How Republicans Are ‘Weaponizing’ Public Office Against Climate Action
A Times investigation revealed a coordinated effort by state treasurers to use government muscle and public funds to punish companies trying to reduce greenhouse gases.
Riley Moore stands in an office wearing a dark suit jacket unbuttoned with a white collared shirt without a tie. On the walls hang portraits of presidents and other officials.
Riley Moore, the West Virginia treasurer, announced last week that several major banks would be barred from government contracts with his state.Credit...Kristian Thacker for The New York Times
By David Gelles
Gelles reviewed more than 10,000 pages of documents and emails while reporting for this article.
Aug. 5, 2022
Nearly two dozen Republican state treasurers around the country are working to thwart climate action on state and federal levels, fighting regulations that would make clear the economic risks posed by a warming world, lobbying against climate-minded nominees to key federal posts and using the tax dollars they control to punish companies that want to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Over the past year, treasurers in nearly half the United States have been coordinating tactics and talking points, meeting in private and cheering each other in public as part of a well-funded campaign to protect the fossil fuel companies that bolster their local economies.
Last week, Riley Moore, the treasurer of West Virginia, announced that several major banks — including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Wells Fargo— would be barred from government contracts with his state because they are reducing their investments in coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel.
Mr. Moore and the treasurers of Louisiana and Arkansas have pulled more than $700 million out of BlackRock, the world’s largest investment manager, over objections that the firm is too focused on environmental issues. At the same time, the treasurers of Utah and Idaho are pressuring the private sector to drop climate action and other causes they label as “woke.”
And treasurers from Pennsylvania, Arizona and Oklahoma joined a larger campaign to thwart the nominations of federal regulators who wanted to require that banks, funds and companies disclose the financial risks posed by a warming planet.
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At the nexus of these efforts is the State Financial Officers Foundation, a little-known nonprofit organization based in Shawnee, Kan., that once focused on cybersecurity, borrowing costs and managing debt loads, among other routine issues.
Then President Biden took office, promising to speed the country’s transition away from oil, gas and coal, the burning of which is dangerously heating the planet.
The foundation began pushing Republican state treasurers, who are mostly elected officials and who are responsible for managing their state’s finances, to use their power to promote oil and gas interests and to stymie Mr. Biden’s climate agenda, records show.
The New York Times reviewed thousands of pages of internal emails and documents obtained through public records requests by Documented, a watchdog group, that shed light on the treasurers’ efforts since January 2021.
At conferences, on weekly calls, and with a steady stream of emails, the foundation hosted representatives from the oil industry and funneled research and talking points from conservative groups to the state treasurers, who have channeled the private groups’ goals into public policy.
The Heritage Foundation, the Heartland Institute and the American Petroleum Institute are among the conservative groups with ties to the fossil fuel industry that have been working with the State Financial Officers Foundation and the treasurers to shape their national strategy.
Many Democratic state treasurers support efforts to combat climate change and want banks and investment firms to be clear about risks posed to returns for retirees and others. Democratic lawmakers in California and New Jersey are working on legislation that would require their state pension systems to divest from fossil fuels. But Democrats have not mounted anything like the national campaign being orchestrated by the State Financial Officers Foundation.
The Republican treasurers skirt the fact that global warming is an economic menace that is damaging industries like agriculture and causing extreme weather that devastates communities and costs taxpayers billions in recovery and rebuilding. Instead, they frame efforts to reduce emissions as a threat to employment and revenue, and have turned climate science into another front in the culture wars.
“This is a departure from their traditional roles,” said Robert Butkin, the former Oklahoma treasurer and a professor at the University of Tulsa. “There used to be a strong nonpartisan and bipartisan ethic among treasurers, but you’ve seen a lot of that erode over the past several years.”
‘Politically motivated’
In November, as major banks and corporations at a global summit in Glasgow were promising to take climate action, the Republican state treasurers were huddling at a State Financial Officers Foundationconference in Orlando, Fla., talking about ways to stop them.
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At the meeting, the group’s chief executive, Derek Kreifels, made a presentation about a new law that had been signed by Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas, a Republican. It prohibited state agencies from investing in businesses that have cut ties with fossil fuel companies.
The Biden Administration’s Environmental Agenda
President Biden is pushing stronger regulations, but faces a narrow path to achieving his goals in the fight against global warming.
Long-Sought Climate Action: After decades of failed attempts, Congress is on the cusp of passing the nation’s first major climate law. The bill avoided the political pitfalls of past legislative attempts by offering only incentives to cut climate pollution, not taxes.
Extreme Heat: President Biden said that he would expand existing federal programs to help Americans cope with the extreme heat wrought by climate change, stopping short of declaring a national emergency.
Supreme Court Ruling: By limiting the Environmental Protection agency’s ability to regulate carbon emissions, the court made it much harder for the president to achieve his climate goals.
Within weeks, Mr. Moore was working with legislators in West Virginia to write a similar bill, which became law in March. While Texas officials have been slow to enforce their law, Mr. Moore was quick to put it into action.
Last week, he notified five major financial institutions — Goldman Sachs, BlackRock, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan and Morgan Stanley — that they are barred from doing business with West Virginia because they have intentionally wound down their dealings with coal companies.
“If a bank, for instance, decides to say they have a no-lending policy as relates to thermal coal, well, then we’ll find a bank that doesn’t have that policy,” Mr. Moore said in an interview.
Mr. Moore went on to offer a classic denial of the overwhelming scientific consensus that the continued burning of oil, gas and coal will lead to planetary catastrophe.
“The climate has been changing in the world since Earth was created,” Mr. Moore said. “Whether these greenhouse gas emissions are contributing to the warming of the globe, I’m not sure I necessarily agree with that.”
The banks targeted by Mr. Moore say they are not boycotting the fossil fuel industry. All of them still do substantial business with oil and gas companies, but in the long run, they say, moving away from fossil fuels makes economic sense. West Virginia, for example, is the second-largest coal-producing state in the country, but production has declined significantly during the past two decades.
“He’s trying to counter pressure that’s coming from progressives on the left,” said Loren Allen, general counsel of the West Virginia Bankers Association, which lobbied against the new law celebrated by Mr. Moore. “Our banks are tied up in the center of a battle that no one can really win.”
Mr. Kreifels declined an interview but said in a statement that concerns over issues like climate change were “putting politics over profits, and likely reducing shareholder value.”
Kentucky, Tennessee and Oklahoma have passed similar laws this year. “Kentucky joins our growing coalition of states that have taken concrete steps to push back against the woke capitalists who are trying to destroy our energy industries,” Mr. Moore said in a news release praising the moves by the states.
Republican lawmakers in more than a dozen other states, including New York, Oregon and Virginia, are trying to advance similar legislation.
The laws could cost taxpayers. A recent study found that Texas cities, where some financial institutions have voluntarily left the market because of laws targeting companies that embrace environmental, social and governance priorities, collectively known as E.S.G., are likely to incur up to $532 million in higher interest costs in less than a year because of the legislation.
“These officials are using the public finance market to make political statements,” said Daniel Garrett, a finance professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and one of the authors of the study. “They can use these laws as a carrot or stick as they desire, but the costs can be potentially quite large.”
The treasurers are increasingly going after individual financial institutions.
In addition to the banks targeted by Mr. Moore, the treasurers of Utah and Idaho are criticizing plans by S&P Global, the ratings agency, to integrate climate risk into its credit ratings of states. And BlackRock, which manages some $8.5 trillion, has been the target of withering attacks for its stance on environmental issues.
Larry Fink, the BlackRock chief executive, has been outspoken in his desire to steer away from fossil fuels and toward what he considers a more sustainable, greener economy.
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“Every government, company, and shareholder must confront climate change,” Mr. Fink wrote in a public letter in 2020 in which he described the integration of climate risk into investment decisions as “a fundamental reshaping of finance.”
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In response, Mr. Moore’s office stopped using BlackRock to help manage West Virginia’s operating funds, withdrawing about $20 million.
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“Larry Fink has stated it very clearly that he thinks capitalism has the power to shape society,” Mr. Moore said. “But my state doesn’t want the same shape of society that Larry Fink does.”
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Other treasurers followed suit. In March, the Arkansas treasurer, Dennis Milligan, pulled $125 million from BlackRock. And in April, the treasurer of Louisiana, John Schroder, emailed Mr. Moore and Marlo Oaks, the Utah treasurer, and boasted about withdrawing more than $600 million from BlackRock accounts. Mr. Schroder said he had also blocked Citibank, Bank of America and JPMorgan from almost $1 billion in bond financing.
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“That’s excellent, John!!!” Mr. Moore replied, according to emails reviewed by The Times. “Great work!!!”
BlackRock declined to comment.
Mr. Milligan, the Arkansas treasurer, emailed a statement in which he said, “I feel a strong sense of responsibility to do my part in not allowing the liberal ‘woke’ agenda to disadvantage the very people I was elected to serve.” Mr. Schroder and Mr. Oaks declined requests for interviews.
Withdrawals by a few states represent a tiny slice of BlackRock’s business. But inside banks and investment firms, there is mounting concern that the state bans could spread to pension funds, which account for nearly $4 trillion in investments across the country.
“We already have a lot of divisions in this country,” said Noah Friend, the former general counsel for the Kentucky treasurer. “I don’t like the idea that if you’re a Republican you have to bank with this company and if you’re a Democrat you have to bank with that company. Everything becomes this politicized decision about who you do business with.”
‘A coordinated attack’
Julie Ellsworth, the Idaho treasurer, asked the State Financial Officers Foundation to distribute a memo that misrepresented the position of banks on environmental, social and governance issues.Credit...Keith Ridler/Associated Press]
Behind the treasurers and the State Financial Officers Foundation is a complex web of conservative groups linked to the fossil fuel industry, as well as some of the biggest names on Wall Street.
In March, Julie Ellsworth, the Idaho treasurer, asked Mr. Kreifels to distribute a memo about the fossil fuel boycott bills to other state treasurers, according to the emails.
The memo had been prepared using research from the Heartland Institute, a think tank with a history of denying climate science, and it misrepresented how banks and other financial institutions were implementing their E.S.G. strategies.
“If you’re a small-business owner with a gasoline powered car, you’re eventually going to be phased out of banks’ portfolios, unless you switch to electric vehicles, of course,” the memo said in a section about how banks would use E.S.G. to force businesses to change. “Similarly, if you want to buy a house in the future that runs on natural gas, you, too, won’t be able to get a mortgage until you put solar panels on the roof.”
No banks have proposed such measures. Ms. Ellsworth declined to comment.
The Heartland Institute has also worked to amplify the treasurers’ message and connect them with influential conservative media personalities including Glenn Beck, records show.
Other groups supporting the treasurers’ efforts include the Heritage Foundation, a think tank that has long opposed action to combat climate change and that has received substantial funding from the oil billionaires Charles G. Koch and David H. Koch.
The State Financial Officers Foundation this year hired CRC Advisors, a conservative strategy firm that was founded by Leonard Leo, who has led a multiyear effort to stack federal courts with judges who oppose climate action. In recent months, CRC Advisors has helped coordinate media responses for treasurers, including Mr. Oaks of Utah, according to emails reviewed by The Times.
And the State Financial Officers Foundation shares many ties with the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, a conservative group with longstanding ties to the Koch brothers.
The American Legislative Exchange Council chief executive, Lisa Nelson, is on the State Financial Officers Foundation board, and ALEC’s chief economist, Jonathan Williams, is a senior policy adviser to the foundation.
Last July, the State Financial Officers Foundation hosted a conference in conjunction with ALEC, and the two groups have even shared blocks of discounted hotel rooms for their event. Mr. Moore and Mr. Kreifels were among the treasurers attending ALEC’s annual meeting in Atlanta last week.
“The State Financial Officers Foundation is a key node in a network of political groups waging a coordinated attack on climate policy,” said Jesse Coleman, a senior researcher at Documented, the watchdog organization that obtained the emails. The group is working “to weaponize state treasurers’ offices against federal appointees, regulations, and corporate policies that address climate change,” he said.
As a nonprofit organization, the State Financial Officers Foundation is not legally required to disclose its funders. A partial list of the organization’s financial supporters on its website shows that it gets funding from not only conservative groups but also from some of the biggest companies in the world, many of which say they are committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. They include JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, Visa, Mastercard, Fidelity, Federated Hermes and SAP — all of which have publicly embraced E.S.G. principles.
Most of the sponsors declined to comment, and many of their contributions were relatively small. In a statement, Beth Richek, a Wells Fargo spokeswoman, acknowledged the bank’s support for the group. “While we may not agree with every position they take, our mutual engagement is important for our company, employees, and customers,” she said.
Blocking federal appointees
Saule Omarova, President Biden’s first nominee to lead the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, withdrew after treasurers portrayed her as a “radical extremist.”Credit...Sarahbeth Maney/The New York Times]
Mr. Biden came to office with a vision: the entire federal government would be focused on reducing the country’s emissions, with new rules implemented across federal agencies staffed by political appointees who embraced the effort.
Among the obstacles Mr. Biden didn’t anticipate were the state treasurers.
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An early sign of turbulence came in May 2021, when 15 treasurers sent a letter to John Kerry, Mr. Biden’s climate envoy, raising concerns about what they said was the administration’s hostility toward the oil and gas industry.
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“Reckless attacks on the fossil fuel industry ultimately cut off paychecks for workers and take food off the table for hard-working middle-class families,” the letter read.
By the end of the year, the treasurers were publicly lobbying against a bevy of proposed rules and nominees.
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Among their first targets was Saule Omarova, Mr. Biden’s nominee for comptroller of the currency. Ms. Omarova was heavily criticized by Republican senators, some moderate Democrats and the banking industry for her desire to limit speculative trading by banks and to open the Federal Reserve to retail banking.
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But she drew the ire of the treasurers for saying that if fossil fuel companies went bankrupt it would help fight climate change. The State Financial Officers Foundation issued a letter signed by more than 20 financial officers calling her a “radical extremist.”
When Ms. Omarova withdrew her nomination in December, Mr. Kreifels sent an email to the treasurers congratulating them. “It’s an honor to work along side you all,” he said in an email titled “VICTORY!”
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Two months later, the treasurers focused on another nominee: Sarah Bloom Raskin, whom Mr. Biden had nominated to be the Federal Reserve’s head of bank oversight. Ms. Raskin, a former Federal Reserve and Treasury official, has argued that financial regulators should police climate risks more diligently.
Mr. Kreifels urged the treasurers to speak out against Ms. Raskin, describing her as an “anti-energy climate change alarmist.”
In emails to state treasurers, the foundation provided draft tweets and other messaging strategies. “We must make as much noise about this as possible,” Mr. Kreifels wrote. “Make this THE ‘kitchen table’ issue in your state for the week.”
Like Ms. Omarova, Ms. Raskin withdrew her nomination. “Sarah was subject to baseless attacks from industry and conservative interest groups,” Mr. Biden said in a statement.
The treasurers have also set their sights on new federal rules and regulations intended to strengthen the government’s ability to act on climate change.
Late last year, the State Financial Officers Foundation worked with the Heritage Foundation to respond to proposals from the Financial Stability Oversight Council, a government panel assigned to minimize risk in the financial sector, on ways to reduce the threats posed by climate change, records show.
And soon after that, Mr. Oaks, the Utah treasurer, drafted a letter opposing a potential Department of Labor rule that would allow retirement plans to consider risks from global warming in their investment strategy. Mr. Kreifels distributed the draft to the foundation’s members, and more than a dozen treasurers signed the final letter. The Department of Labor has not decided whether to implement the rule.
This year, the treasurers targeted the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. After the agency proposed a rule to require banks to consider climate-related financial risk, executives from the Heritage Foundation sent Mr. Kreifels and Mr. Oaks a memo outlining their opposition. Within weeks, dozens of state treasurers and attorneys general from Republican-led states submitted comments objecting to the proposed rule.
“This special concern for and attention to climate-related risks is irrational,” one comment read.
And in May, Mr. Kreifels organized a call with the treasurers to discuss regulations proposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission that would require companies to publicly disclose climate risks to investors. The featured guest was a representative from the American Petroleum Institute, the lobbying arm of the fossil fuel industry.
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The next month, the State Financial Officers Foundation sent a 20-page letter signed by more than a dozen treasurers, calling the S.E.C.’s proposed rule, which has not yet been enacted, “irrational climate exceptionalism, elevating climate issues to a place of prominence in disclosures that they do not deserve.”