This week saw grassroots actions against the firm in Palo Alto, Los Angeles, Boston and New York. CEO Larry Fink's media response was predictable, and unacceptable.
The September Swarm against BlackRock is on!
Activists gathered in Palo Alto and Boston and called on BlackRock to stop funding the climate emergency, forest destruction and respect indigenous rights. Partners and allies in Boston also delivered over 100,000 signatures to the biggest asset managers (BlackRock, State Street, and Vanguard) demanding they adopt robust deforestation and indigenous rights policies.
Los Angeles and New York also raised the heat.
In New York, Mijente, NYCC, CODEPINK, FOE, Detention Watch Network, Sanctuary4All, Sunrise NY, and others rallied outside BlackRock’s NYC HQ and online over BlackRock’s investments in Palantir, a tech company providing services to ICE that enable the Trump Administration’s agenda of mass deportations and human rights abuses.
Listen to the powerful recording here and follow Mijente’s important work.
In Los Angeles, our friends at CODEPINK swarmed the LA BlackRock office and called out BlackRock for its role in driving the climate crisis as well as global militarism.
BlackRock is paying attention. CEO Larry Fink was asked about the protests during a Morningstar interview, and said he has no plans to fully divest from carbon-intensive industries — despite mounting pressure from environmentalists:
Fink was asked about the protests and whether the CEO could “ever foresee a time when index providers in passive products … would start eliminating certain kinds of companies from indexes.” Fink, who refers to himself as an environmentalist and a capitalist, said he understands what the advocates are asking for. But that’s not BlackRock’s job, he added.”
Well, Larry Fink and the rest of the BlackRock executive team must know social movements are not going to stop until they make it BlackRock’s job!
More coverage of the actions was in Business Insider and Ignites Europe.
Upcoming Swarm actions this week include actions at BlackRock offices in: Chicago, Miami, Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Zurich, and London. Our Swarm will conclude on October 2nd where we will join the Stop the Money Pipeline Tar Sands Solidarity Day of Action.
Let’s keep Swarming everyone until they get the message!
