Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has asked the state’s pension fund to examine its Bud Light-maker Anheuser-Busch InBev holdings for putting social activism ahead of shareholders, the Daily Mail reports.
“We must prudently manage the funds of Florida’s hardworking law enforcement officers, teachers, firefighters and first responders in a manner that focuses on growing returns, not subsidizing an ideological agenda through woke virtue signaling,” DeSantis wrote in a letter to the fund’s interim director Lamar Taylor.
The Florida Retirement System Pension Plan is the fifth largest pension fund in the country, with $180 billion of assets under management.
Florida may potentially sue Anheuser-Busch on behalf of the fund’s shareholders, said the governor, a trustee on the pension fund’s board that manages retirement funds for the state’s workers.
“All options are on the table,” said DeSantis, also a 2024 Republican presidential candidate.
The move comes as the maker of Bud Light, formerly America’s No. 1 beer, lost $27 billion in market capitalization after its controversial partnership with transgender social media influencer Dylan Mulvaney. Bud Light beer sales have nose-dived by as much as 34% in the three months since due to nationwide boycotts.
According to hospitality consumption data platform Union, in the past three months, Bud Light has dropped to the fourth most popular beer in the U.S. behind Miller Light, Michelob Ultra and Coors Light, now the No. 1, 2 and 3 beers in America.
DeSantis has long stood up against what he calls “woke capitalism,” including an ongoing battle with Disney.
Asked if he would sue Disney, DeSantis replied, “I don’t know that we’d be the right one to do it.”
DeSantis’ beef with Disney began last year with the then-CEO of the entertainment giant criticized the governor for his Parental Rights in Education law.
The law was passed to prohibit schoolchildren in grades kindergarten through third from being instructed about sexual orientation and gender identity. Earlier this year, that law was expanded to the sixth grade.
In February, DeSantis took control of the 30-square-mile Reedy Creek Improvement District in Orlando from Disney to make the area responsible for paying taxes and subject to local and state laws. Previously, the district governed itself.
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