BlackRock Pushing Chinese Social Credit System in America: News Editor

The BlackRock logo is pictured outside its headquarters in the Manhattan borough of New York City on May 25, 2021. (Carlo Allegri/Reuters)

A news editor slammed BlackRock for attempting to push a Chinese regime-style social credit system into American industry and warned in a recent interview that CEOs were feeling the heat due to such attempts.

Breitbart’s economics editor, John Carney, said that BlackRock, with its environmental, social, and governance (ESG) agenda, was trying to implement China’s social credit system on American corporations.

“Corporate CEOs feel under pressure to adopt the right environmental, the right social, the right diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, all because one of the biggest investors in the whole world has sent the message to them that this is what they care about,” he said in a Fox interview on Monday.

“And the people whose money BlackRock is investing also haven’t said that’s what they want,” Carney said. “And that’s one of the reasons BlackRock has tried more recently to walk this back—because they realized that they had gotten way out to the left of the American people, and they need the American people.

“That’s why they’re the biggest asset manager—because they’re running people’s retirement funds. If people say, ‘Wait a minute, I don’t want you pushing this far-left agenda on America, give me my money back,’ that will put the company in trouble. So they’re trying to run away from this.”

BlackRock gets investment from multiple sources, including government and pension funds. For example, the New York State Common Retirement Fund (CRF) has invested in BlackRock’s Climate Change Index strategy fund.

Last year, Louisiana removed BlackRock from managing its public investment funds due to the company’s “anti-fossil fuel policies.” In the first quarter of 2023, BlackRock had $9.09 trillion worth of assets under management, making it the biggest asset manager in the world.

Carney’s comments came in the context of BlackRock CEO Larry Fink’s statement in 2017 during an event where the executive admitted that the firm was trying to “force change” in companies.

“Well, behaviors are going to have to change, and this is one thing we’re asking companies. You have to force behaviors. And at BlackRock, we are forcing behaviors,” Fink said.

“We added four more points in terms of diverse employment this year. What we’re doing internally is, if you don’t achieve these levels of impact, your compensation could be impacted. ... You have to force behaviors. And if you don’t force behaviors—whether it’s gender or race, or just any way you want to say the composition of your team—you’re going to be impacted. ... We’re going to have to force change.”

Carney pointed out that BlackRock is now trying to “backpedal” on Fink’s 2017 comments, which is now gaining online traction. “They’re saying this is very old. This is how we were thinking of things in 2017. We don’t really want to do it. But they do.”

Reversing Course on ESG Agenda

BlackRock’s backpedaling on some ESG issues was evident in its 2023 annual letter to investors. Fink admitted in the letter that oil and gas were “vital” to global energy demand—a shift from his earlier stance promoting a climate change agenda focused on progressive values denouncing fossil-based fuels.

“For years now, we have viewed climate risk as an investment risk. That’s still the case,” the letter said. However, the transition toward a low-carbon economy “will not be a straight line,” with various industries and nations moving at different speeds in terms of adoption. “Oil and gas will play a vital role in meeting global energy demands through that journey.”

In his 2020 letter to CEOs, Fink talked about BlackRock “exiting investments that present a high sustainability-related risk, such as thermal coal producers” and “launching new investment products that screen fossil fuels.”

However, BlackRock has suffered losses recently, putting the company under pressure. Between 2021 and 2022, BlackRock’s revenues fell from $19.37 billion to $17.87 billion. Its assets under management fell from $10.01 trillion to $8.59 trillion.

In October 2022, UBS downgraded BlackRock, with analyst Brennan Hawken stating that the downgrade was because of “environmental pressure to earnings and risk from the firm’s ESG positioning.”

Despite BlackRock claiming that Fink’s 2017 statements about forcing change in companies are outdated, Carney does not believe the company has abandoned its DEI push.

“They’re also really into what he said [about] scorecards. ... So, what they’re doing is they’re actually keeping very careful track. How well have you done in pushing an environmental agenda? How well have you done in pushing the DEI agenda? And if you don’t have a high enough score, you could suffer in terms of what their investments could be.”

Pride Month Duplicity

In his interview with Fox, Carney was also asked about corporations adding Pride flags to their U.S. Twitter accounts while choosing not to do the same in the Middle East, where LGBTQ people have suffered abuses.

Companies such as Mercedes-Benz, Cisco, Bethesda, Lenovo, and BMW are showing off LGBT-themed logos on their U.S. Twitter accounts as part of celebrating Pride Month, while their Middle Eastern accounts remain unchanged.

Carney pointed out that the duplicity in company stances is simply due to money. The principle of these firms is to “kiss the [expletive] of the regime in charge.”

“So right now in America, BlackRock and others and all of these woke corporations look at the regime in charge as the far left. When they are going to Saudi Arabia, they say we’re going to obey the sheiks. In America, they obey the wokes,” he said.

“That’s the system here. It’s not even hypocrisy. It’s one rule. It’s obey the powerful. And that’s what these people are doing.”