Vivek Ramaswamy, GOP presidential candidate has taken a swipe at the climate change agenda in the US, describing it as a mere hoax.
In an fireside chat with Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds, Ramaswamy said that environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) business policies are among the “grave threats to liberty, noting that “the climate change agenda” is a “hoax.”
“They’re using our money… to implement social and environmental agendas through the backdoor. Through corporate America,” Ramaswamy was quoted as saying. “Using your retirement funds and your investment accounts to vote for racial equity audits or Scope 3 emissions caps that you didn’t know they were using your money to do, and that Congress would have never passed through the front door.”
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ESG is said to have become a political punching bag for conservatives, who view it as corporations overreaching into the political space. The policies increase diverse hiring, reduce carbon emissions and manage how they invest their money with climate in mind.
“This is actually one of the grave threats to liberty today. Wherever you stand on climate change — I think most of the climate change agenda is, I’m just going to say it, is a hoax,” Ramaswamy said. “I’m going to call that for what it is.”
The entrepreneur further claimed that ESG is comparable to the “back-rooms deals” of Old World Europe, and called for more public debate on the topic.
“Wherever you stand on that, we should settle that through free space and open debate in the public square in a constitutional republic,” he said. “That’s the way we do things, post-1776, on this side of the Atlantic.”
Story was adapted from The Hill.
