Disney shareholders overwhelmingly rejected a proposal by the National Center for Public Policy Research (NCPPR) to withdraw from the Human Rights Campaign’s (HRC) Corporate Equality Index (CEI).
The proposal, submitted through NCPPR’s Free Enterprise Project (FEP), argued that Disney’s participation in the CEI, where it has consistently received a perfect score, alienates customers and investors due to the HRC’s “partisan, divisive, and increasingly radical criteria.”
The FEP’s proposal specifically criticized HRC’s support for transgender rights, accusing them and organizations like GLSEN, the Trevor Project, and GLAAD of promoting “gender confusion in children” and advocating for “irreversible surgical procedures on confused teens.” They also pointed to Disney’s 2022 opposition to Florida’s “Parental Rights in Education Act” (dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” law) as an example of detrimental “activism.”
Disney’s board recommended voting against the proposal, reaffirming their commitment to LGBTQIA+ workplace equality, as reflected in their perfect CEI score. The preliminary vote count showed only 1% of shares supporting the NCPPR’s initiative.
