(DCWatchdog.com) – With his first presidential veto, Joe Biden blocked a bipartisan bill banning far-left ESG (“environmental, social, and governance”) policies in the investment of retirement funds.
The bill, which the US Senate passed with support from two Democrat senators, had reversed a rule issued by Biden’s Labor Department.
The Labor Department’s rule allowed considering ESG when investing retirement money.
“I just vetoed my first bill,” Biden declared in a video on his Twitter account.
“This bill would risk your retirement savings by making it illegal to consider risk factors MAGA House Republicans don’t like,” the president claimed, as cited by Breitbart News.
“Your plan manager should be able to protect your hard-earned savings — whether Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene likes it or not,” Biden declared.
The legislation he vetoed was HR 30, a Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution reversing the Labor Department’s initiative to make the leftist political agenda part of retirement investment decisions.
The ESG rule empowers retirement fund managers to consider climate change and prioritize ESG initiatives when exercising shareholder rights and making decisions on retirement investments.
The Labor Department’s regulation had rolled back a rule to protect Americans’ retirement plans from investments based on the leftist political agenda adopted during the Trump administration.
The anti-ESG bill that Biden vetoed cleared Congress on March 1 after it was passed by the GOP majority in the House of Representatives and was approved in a 50-46 vote in the Senate.
In the upper chamber, the bill was passed with the votes of the Republican minority and two Democrat senators – Jon Tester of Montana and Joe Manchin of West Virginia.
Even before the Senate vote, the White House had announced that Biden would veto the bill were it to pass Congress.
The GOP House leadership has already scheduled a vote on March 23 to try to override the president’s veto. However, that remains highly unlikely since doing so would require a two-thirds majority in both chambers of Congress.
“It is clear that President Biden wants Wall Street to use your hard-earned money not to grow your savings, but to fund a far-left political agenda. That will hurt seniors and workers,” House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said in a statement cited by Newsmax.
“Despite a clear and bipartisan rejection of the rule from Congress, President Biden is choosing to put his administration’s progressive agenda above the well-being of the American people,” reacted, in turn, Democrat US Senator Joe Manchin.
According to West Virginia state Treasurer Riley Moore, a leading state-level critic of ESG rules, Biden’s veto shows he “stands with the woke capitalists and their radical globalist agenda instead of the best interests and financial security of the American people.”
“This rule will allow Wall Street elites to use the pension and retirement plans of millions of hard-working Americans to advance left-wing social agendas that undermine our citizens’ values and way of life,” the state treasurer explained.
What is your opinion about Biden’s veto? Do you agree with Senator Joe Manchin when he says, “Biden is choosing to put his administration’s progressive agenda above the well-being of the American people”? Share your view by emailing [email protected]. Thank you.
Joe Biden issued his first veto on Monday, rejecting a bipartisan bill that would have reversed his Labor Department rule about ESG in retirement investing. https://t.co/5hZ78NSi4O
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) March 20, 2023
