A decade ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook gave a stirring convocation address to the graduating class of George Washington University.

“The sidelines are not where you want to live your life,” Cook said. “The world needs you in the arena. There are problems that need to be solved. Injustices that need to be ended.”

Cook’s message was right but was missed by conservative shareholders, who for far too long sat on the sidelines while activists on the far-Left, like the radical Human Rights Campaign, Engine No. 1, and As You Sow, have staged a hostile takeover of Corporate America.

In the process, seemingly invincible brands like Bud Light, Target, and Disney bent the knee to these activists and ended up losing billions of dollars in value. Worse, a host of once-cherished American brands have been hijacked, transformed into tools wielded by ideologically driven forces. These actors pursue agendas that clash head-on with the core beliefs of the companies’ own shareholders, as well as the bedrock principles of free markets and constitutional liberties that define our nation.

That’s a problem. One might even call it an injustice that needs to be ended.

Your rights as a shareholder in many ways mirror your rights as a citizen. Like elected officials in Washington, D.C., or your state capital are accountable to their voters, leaders of publicly traded companies answer to their shareholders. That includes major stockholders like Cook, but also everyday Americans who invest in a variety of ways, including through a 401(k) or other investment products. So, just like at the ballot box, your vote matters at the annual shareholder meetings of the companies you own.

Yet, unlike the political process, many Americans simply don’t exercise their voting rights as shareholders. Instead, they delegate that right to activist investment or proxy advisors who often vote against their values. Like a football game where only one team takes the field, the score is as lopsided as you would expect.

Fringe groups pushing extreme ideas understand this all too well. Take the HRC’s current requirement that companies must pay for life-altering and experimental puberty-blocking drugs and cross-sex hormones for children as part of their healthcare plan to earn a coveted 100% on the so-called “Corporate Equality Index.”

The HRC touts 765 businesses — including Apple — that bow to this demand, but it couldn’t be further out of step with most shareholders. Nearly 7 in 10 Americans oppose puberty blockers for young children and the U.S. Supreme Court is currently considering whether to uphold a Tennessee law protecting children from this practice, with similar laws in a total of 27 states likely affected by the decision.

Thankfully, shareholders who represent mainstream American values are finally taking Cook’s advice and getting in the game. Working with dozens of values-aligned investors, financial advisors, corporate engagement advisors, and state financial officers that together represent over $250 billion in assets under management, Alliance Defending Freedom and Inspire Investing are leading the charge with a coalition that has filed over 68 shareholder resolutions at over 50 corporations this year alone.

For the first time, we are setting the agenda for corporate America. And that’s clearest to see at Cook’s Apple, where all four resolutions on the proxy ballot for the company’s Feb. 25 annual meeting come from our values-aligned shareholder allies.

Inspire Investing filed a resolution calling on Apple executives to report to their shareholders the impact of partnering with divisive groups like the HRC and the highly discredited Southern Poverty Law Center, which played a prominent role in the FBI’s targeting of Roman Catholics and parents protecting their kids by speaking out at school board meetings during the previous administration.

Other resolutions include a call for transparency on ethical AI data collection and usage, as well as a directive for Apple to stop discriminating against employees under the financially and legally risky banner of DEI policies from the National Center for Public Policy Research. Meanwhile, Bowyer Research worked with the American Family Association to file a proposal asking Apple leadership to explain why it removed an iOS software function designed to identify child sex abuse material — a decision that has led company leaders to admit Apple has become “the greatest platform for distributing child porn, etc.”

Apple should at least see the merit in this proposal, but instead, they are pushing shareholders to reject it — and even tried to dodge accountability altogether by begging the SEC to keep it off their proxy statement. The SEC said no, thanks to ADF’s intervention.

A decade ago, Tim Cook told graduates, “There are problems that need to be solved. Injustices that need to be ended.” Today, the injustice lies in Apple and other corporate giants ignoring shareholders, aligning with divisive groups, and silencing dissent — all while straying from the values that built them.

Freedom and free market loving shareholders are done watching from the sidelines. We’re in the arena now, holding Cook and his peers to their own call: end the injustices, starting with providing accountability to your shareholders.

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Jeremy Tedesco (@Jeremy_Tedesco) is senior counsel, senior vice president of corporate engagement at Alliance Defending Freedom (@ADFLegal).

Robert Netzly (@RobertNetzly) is CEO of Inspire Investing (@InspireAdvisor).

The views expressed in this piece are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

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