Earth Quaker Action Team will rally, march, and pray at Vanguard’s Headquarters in Malvern Wednesday to protest the firm’s continued investments in fossil fuel projects destroying the environment and exacerbating climate change.
Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights, Chester Residents Concerned for Quality Living, Stop the Money Pipeline, will join EQAT members to protest recent Vanguard-backed projects such as Mountain Valley Pipeline from West Virginia to North Carolina and the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline in Uganda and Tanzania.
“We’re feeling excited about Voices of Vanguard’s Impact and Visions for a Livable Future,” said EQAT Media and Research Coordinator Eve Gutman. “Hundreds of people will be coming together to take powerful, nonviolent action at Vanguard because more and more people around the country — and the world — see Vanguard’s role in righting the ship and steering us towards a livable future for all.”
During the protest, many people who live next to the aforementioned pipelines will talk about the major damage the projects have done to their communities. The protest will coincide with Vanguard replacing their CEO Tim Buckley with Salim Ramji, who is set to assume his new position July 8.
“As Salim Ramji begins his tenure as Vanguard’s next CEO, we are calling on him to be a true leader and respond to Vanguard’s role in fueling climate change as the world’s largest investor in fossil fuels with the urgency the issue requires,” said Gutman. “Vanguard should use its influence as a powerful shareholder to push the companies it invests in to do better on climate change and exit its investments in fossil fuel companies that refuse to transition their businesses to be in alignment with a livable future.”
In recent years, Vanguard has been targeted by many environmental groups for investing more money into fossil fuel companies than any other investment firm. Urgewald, an environmental research group based in Germany, found that Vanguard has invested $262 billion into the fossil fuel industry, $6 million more than BlackRock, while also pulling out of the Net Zero Asset Managers Initiative in December 2022. Between January 2022 and May 2023, Vanguard issued nearly $60 million in bonds to EQT Corporation, which was a major client of the Mountain Valley pipeline. This was nearly $15 million more than the second-highest company in the same period, which was also BlackRock.
“Past company leadership has refused to take meaningful climate action, lagging behind in the asset management industry by neglecting to engage seriously with portfolio companies on climate issues and by failing to release plans to decarbonize Vanguard’s investment portfolio in line with a 1.5 degree ceiling on global temperature increase,” noted EQAT in a press release. “On July 3rd at Vanguard headquarters, in the largest Vanguard protest yet, concerned and affected people of many generations from near and far will come together to make this point clear to Vanguard’s incoming CEO: Vanguard is steering us toward climate disaster.”
The protest will take place 2 p.m. at 785 Cedar Rd., and will be followed by a march and prayer outside of the Vanguard headquarters.
Read more of our EQAT/Vanguard coverage:
Quaker Group Offers Nonviolent Direct Action Training for Activists
EQAT Holds Prayer Action to Urge Vanguard to Transition Toward Sustainable Investment Practices
Bucks County Residents Participate in ‘Never Vanguard’ Launch
How Protests That Double as Trainings Are Growing This Fossil Fuel Divestment Campaign
Quaker Climate Justice Group Builds Skills to Shine Light on Vanguard’s Climate Problem
Vanguard Deserves Coal This Christmas for Prioritizing Climate-Destroying Profits Over the Planet
Protest of Constellation Energy’s Croydon Generating Station
