Two “woke” big bank CEOs sat silently, and another read a scripted response, on Wednesday when Sen. Tim Scott, R-SC, asked them to explain their opposition to Georgia‘s election integrity law during a hearing before the Senate Banking Committee, Fox Business reported.
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan, Citibank CEO Jane Fraser, and Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon all signed onto a letter that called Georgia’s mainstream voting law “discriminatory” because it allegedly prevents eligible voters from having “an equal and fair opportunity to cast a ballot.”
“It seems you are all very comfortable picking winners and losers – particularly those who signed the letter in opposition to Georgia,” Scott said in reference to major banks using their economic power to punish conservative states.
Then Scott asked them to describe their concerns with the law, since he “as a Southerner and African American who has voted in the South all my life would hate any form of discrimination, anything that restricts voting rights.”
“What part of the Georgia law restricted voting rights or was discriminatory?” Scott asked.
Fraser and Solomon sat silently.
Moynihan deflected responsibility for the decision and said that the hurt feelings of his subordinates informed the company’s choice to sign the letter.
“Our company signed that letter based on input from our [Environmental, Social, and Governance] committee and our teammates about how they felt when the law came in,” Moynihan said.
He added that his “teammates” showed “grave concern” about the law.
Like human resources departments, ESG committees push progressive policies throughout corporations.
“You’re diving into which laws you want to uphold and which laws you find offensive but you can’t articulate a position on why those things are offensive,” Scott said. “It just seems confusing to me that one would say ‘I support capitalism’ but [you all] are doing these things that are inconsistent [with capitalism] and [you] cannot articulate a single reason why [you] oppose the law in Georgia.”
