RADIOMay 13, 2022

How ESG & BlackRock are ROBBING YOU of financial control

Vivek Ramaswamy — author of ‘Woke, INC.’ and founder of Roviant Sciences — currently is working hard to TAKE BACK control from the three largest asset managers in the world…including BlackRock, which manages over 10 TRILLION dollars of everyday Americans' finances (that's more than half the U.S. GDP!). ‘They’re using the money from everyday, American citizens…to advance these social and environmental policies that we should instead be debating as citizens,’ Ramaswamy tells Glenn. But rather than face antitrust violations, firms like BlackRock instead are CELEBRATED thanks to ESG. Ramaswamy tells Glenn how his new company will help Americans regain financial control and reestablish our TRUE free market...

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: A guy I have to tell you -- if I could make a list of the five people that I'm watching that can really change the world, Elon Musk is probably number one. Number two is probably Vivek Ramaswamy, who is now -- if I can get his name right. He's the author of Woke, Inc. But he just did something that -- Vivek, thank you. You are -- you are in the position to do something, you're in the position, where you don't have to do something. And you are taking on BlackRock. The right way. Can you explain what you're doing?

VIVEK: Yeah. So we're taking on the three largest asset managers in the world, Glenn. Starting with BlackRock who is managing over $10 trillion. That's one firm managing more than half of the U.S. GDP. And here's the problem, Glenn: They're using the money of everyday American citizens, most of the listeners of this program, yours and mine, to foist values on to corporate America, to advocate for values, in corporate America. To vote our shares in corporate America. In ways that we would disapprove of, to advance these social and environmental policies, that we should instead be debating as citizens.

GLENN: Amen.

VIVEK: And Glenn, you know this stuff well. Just think of this for a second, as a thought experiment. If you had the CEOs of Exxon and Shell and Chevron get together in a room and say, we're going to cut gas production.

And then gas prices spike at the pump as a result.

GLENN: Uh-huh.

VIVEK: This would be the stuff of movies. People would be walking up, perp walks and handcuffs. Okay. It's anti-trust violations.

Guess what, when the same owners of these competing firms, all force those firms to do the exact same thing, somehow that gets celebrated as ESG instead.

That is a problem. And that's a problem we're solving through competition. And so my message to BlackRock is really simple. Good news is we'll solve your anti-trust problem. The bad news is we're going to do it by taking market share, by actually representing the voices of everyday American citizens in every boardroom in this country, eventually.

GLENN: So when will this begin? When can average people move their 401(k)s or their investments over to you?

VIVEK: Yeah. So the movement begins in the third quarter of the year. What we said that the first products will launch in the third quarter. This was just unveiling the company itself.

And I have been humbled. I've been blown away by the level of support we've received. In fact, the number of employees, of the big asset managers including Vanguard and BlackRock and State Street, who have said, we are -- and these are their words and not mine. In one message I got, we're fed up with the nonsense. Ready for something new. And, you know what, I don't hold it against employees who are willing to move with their own feet.

Actually give credit to brave people who are willing to act on their convictions. And, you know what, these firms did not act this way 20 years ago. This is a newer trend. Even for employees of these large asset managers, who have seen the lurch that these firms have taken. I give those employees credit, and our doors are wide open. But to answer your question, Glenn. It's the third quarter of the year that we'll be launching it.

GLENN: So, Vivek, I've been preaching this ESG stuff for a while now.

And --

VIVEK: Yes, you have.

GLENN: And couldn't get -- couldn't get the states, you know, about 20 of them. But so many Republicans even are like, this is a private business. They can do whatever they want. Well, S&P global just came and said, we're now rating the states, with ESG scores. So you may -- you may lose your status for businesses. Because we may not be able to recommend that people do business in your state.

VIVEK: At a certain state, we should just call the charade for what it is. We tell ourselves, we live in a Democratic society. Let's call the charade for what it is, and start bowing to our monarchs instead. This isn't even a battle between left and right, Glenn. This is a battle between living in a Democratic republic, and living in a monarchy, where a certain group of corpranacrats, people who run a corpatocracy and monarchy, decide what the right answer is to these moral questions for everybody else.

Now, I don't think that public policy makers are up to the task. I think you agree with me on that. I also think a lot of public policies can have unintended consequences. That's a different game. That's not the game I'm playing. At the end of the day, I think that the market here. The actual market. The true free market.

Not the one guided by the invisible hand of government. But the one that's guided by the demand of everyday citizens. That's the system that I think could deliver the cleanest solution. If brave enough people are actually brave enough to step into that individual. I think there's a great economic opportunity. I think there's a great opportunity to change our culture. So that's the path I'm taking. That doesn't mean the policy makers can't act. It's just, I'm focused more on the market track.

GLENN: You know what's amazing to me. I see these media companies, that sell for a billion dollars.

And they got nothing. We're the largest streaming network for right of center in the world.

It's like we're worth $10. It's like, you're never going to be able to sell that. You're like, the market doesn't understand. And they refuse to understand, that I don't know. Half the country, doesn't agree with them. And still wants products.

VIVEK: And, Glenn, let me just give you one shade further. I agree with everything you you said.

But further, the 100+ million people. The 100+ million people you're talking about, when you adjust for spending power, when you adjust for investment power, when you adjust for being good credit risks, good insurance risk. People don't lie on their credit card applications. People who have actual savings to put into investment funds. People who are hard workings, people who are sticky customers. That actually becomes one of the largest economies in the world.

GLENN: Right.

VIVEK: Now, that being said, I want to share with you my perspective here. I don't want to see a red economy and a blue economy in the long run.

GLENN: I don't either.

VIVEK: This is beyond -- this is beyond Democratic and Republican partisan politics. I do want to get politics out of the private sector. But we're not starting from neutral territory. So I think using market competition and competitive force, to bring that true diversity to the marketplace of ideas, when right now, especially in capital markets, Glenn, we have one view. It's the ESG centric view. And ESG is whatever BlackRock decides it means on a given day.

What we really need is just true competition and true diversity. If we get there, I'm happy. And I don't want partisanized economies left at the end of it.

I actually think that the economy can bring us together. The private sector, if it's tee politicized, can bring us together. We're just taking the steps to get there.

GLENN: Well, if we have to have a parallel economy, then we have to have it. But a parallel economy will take money from the other side. And they will either get competitive or they will be destroyed.

VIVEK: That's exactly right. I predict the way this plays out isn't that we have two permanent parallel economies, but companies like Airbnb and BlackRock and Disney, and for that matter, you know, every other company in corporate America is going to wake up and say five years from now, our approach to diversity and inclusion, probably wasn't as diverse and inclusive as we thought.

GLENN: Right.

VIVEK: They swing the pendulum back. That's how we get our culture back.

GLENN: Did you see what BlackRock, they announced today?

VIVEK: Of course. Of course. I think it's -- I don't mean to falsely pat myself on the back or take credit. Is not about me. It's about them trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube, right?

So now, what are we going to see from BlackRock? Mark my words.

They'll say, well, the proposals we put up a couple of years ago, we want to roll those back, a little bit.

You know what I would say? That's an example of an institution that operates without a soul.

Have somebody who has a different view, who we could engage in healthy debate in the open. Rather than to debate with somebody who wants to look like a flag, but waves in whatever direction the wind is blowing. Now they're trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube. I think they're going to have a very difficult time to do that. I think it's revealing, how they sense the tide is changing. We'll lead that tide hopefully to a more positive place.

GLENN: So I only have about three minutes left. And I want to ask you a question. And they're just ethical questions, that I don't know how to solve, both in the news today. Goldman Sachs backed firm buys Florida community of single-family homes for $45 million. BlackRock is doing this too.

They're coming in. Paying overprice. Buying old neighborhoods. I don't want to tell companies, that they can't do that. I wouldn't be opposed to that, if it wasn't for ESG, and the great reset, which says, you're not going to own anything, by 2030.

And everybody will be renters. So what are we -- what do you think of this? And how do you deal with this?

VIVEK: It's a great question, Glenn. I like the intellectual honesty with which you're approaching this too. This traces back to a deeper problem. Of the government, effectively having a private sector suckling at its teat over the last two years.

But in return for the trade of making sure that those private actors implement government policies through the back door. The government couldn't pass through the front door.

So institutions like BlackRock are effectively benefiting from a decades' long policy of not only easy money from the fed, but also Treasury spending. Also, of course, if you look at who administered the covid-19 stimulus packages. Guess what, it was none other than BlackRock. Taking their range at every step as well.

So this is crony capitalism. If it's a truly free market and private institutions are deciding to invest in real estate, you're right. I don't think that that's something that we should worry about as policy makers. Or policy makers should worry about. In saying that that's something that they shouldn't be allowed to do. But we don't live in that free market.

Right now, it's the invisible hand. Really, the invisible fist of government, that's engaged in mutual back scratching exercise, with firms like Goldman Sachs.

That's been happening since 2008. But also with firms like BlackRock in more recent years.

That make this the illusion of the free market, but they're using the slogan of free marketism, as a slogan to defang the conservative opposition, that you would otherwise feel in the intuitions, but conservative dogma says that we shouldn't interfere with the free market. I think that's correct, so long as we restore the actual free market. That's a complicated issue.

GLENN: Yeah. No.

I appreciate your answer. We're talking to Vivek Ramaswamy. Two kind of in the same question. There's a story from CNN today. Tesla stocks slide. Raises doubts about Elon Musk's Twitter purchase.

I think they're sliding just like everybody else. Myself.

And the other -- the other thing that I really would like your view on, there's a story in Fortune today, coin base admits users may lose crypto if exchange goes abrupt. Now, when I read the headline. My first thought was, Good Lord, are they going bankrupt? This is the federal government requiring them to disclose, what would happen in worst-case scenario. And now it's being reported on, and the average person will look at this, and go. Oh, there's trouble at coin base. Is this just another game that CNN is playing with Tesla, and the United States government is playing against cryptocurrency?

VIVEK: So you understand this really well, Glenn. Your intuitions are in the right place. And they're doing this all over the place. You're seeing it in the green revolution too. The -- we, the regulators aren't really forcing companies to pass a particular agenda.

Of course, we would never do that. We're just picking certain areas, where they have to over disclose their risks, such as climate risk. And you can see the war on crypto has a very similar feel to it as well. It rhymes in the similar way. Well, if we say what, the disclosure regime is really just a vehicle for packing in, for smuggling in a viewpoint-based agenda that forces companies to either bend the knee in a certain direction or not.

And when you combine that with the forces of the media which has really just become a fourth branch of government in many senses, that's how you use this soft power. It's not hard legislative power. Though, that may be come soon.

But it's this soft power of using a combination of a disclosure regime with regulatory pressure from the back door, with regulatory favors, given to large existing incumbents, that then create the conditions for nothing, but the right answer, which is the ESG-centric answer to have been the product of what they will say is the free market. Of course, it's really just the invisible fist of government, and the more -- and I don't use that word lightly.

But the more totalitarian forces behind it, conspiring to get to that same outcome. So I appreciate your insight, in helping people see through, with what otherwise seems like an ordinary, less nefarious affair.

GLENN: I mean, I tell you, you say authoritarian. The title of my book is The Great Reset: Twenty-first Century Fascism.

And it's -- people are like, you can't say fascism. But that's what it is. It is that.

VIVEK: The classical definition of fascism, is a merger of corporate power and state power. And I think we're seeing the beginning of the rise of that. On modern American soil. And in some ways, we fought a revolutionary war in 1776. It was not a war between partisan on one side or another. It was a war between the everyday citizen, and the monarchial class back in 1776.

GLENN: Yep.

VIVEK: And today, the new battle line is between the everyday citizen and the managerial class in the United States.

That's not left or right. It's something more fundamental than that.

GLENN: And isn't it crazy, that it's happening all over the world?

It's happening in every western cup. And it's being misidentified in every country.

VIVEK: You nailed it, Glenn. This is a trans partisan, transnational war for the heart and soul of both capitalism, and democracy.

And I even -- not to be fancy about this. Transpartisan, transnational. I even say it's transtemporal. This is transnational back in 1776. The French Revolution played out 13 years later. It was a Trans Atlantic battle then too. We live in one of these moments, where it's like the dose in the water. It's kind of like it was back in 1776. This goes beyond geographic boundaries, and partisan boundaries.

It's the human struggle between the citizen and the monarch. Between the citizen and the managerial class.

That's what is at stake today. And we side on the side of the everyday citizen. I'm just choosing to do it, not just through policies, but through actually creating a vehicle to compete with these new monarchs like BlackRock and Vanguard. So that's what I set out to do what I'm doing.

GLENN: Vivek, I cannot -- and I mean this sincerely. I have waited for people like you, to start standing up. And you have for a long time. But standing up -- I mean, you're going against BlackRock. And others.

I mean, you're going to get slapped around. Thank you. Thank you for that. I appreciate it. You give a lot of people, including me hope.

VIVEK: Thank you, Glenn. Appreciate it. Take your support every step. Buh-bye.

GLENN: Vivek Ramaswamy, the author of Woke, Inc. And talking about his startup that's going after BlackRock and ESG.

THE GLENN BECK PODCAST

Are Epstein's "Blackmail Videos" Being Used for Leverage RIGHT NOW?

What was Jeffrey Epstein's operation all about. If he was at the center of a massive blackmail operation to compromise those in positions of power, who is in possession of that information now? Glenn Beck and ATF Whistleblower John Dodson analyze the details of this situation and give their thoughts on what is the most likely reality surrounding Epstein.

Watch Glenn Beck's FULL Interview with ATF Whistleblower John Dodson HERE

WARNING: How America Elects a Socialist President in 2028 | Glenn TV | Ep 444

The rise of Zohran Mamdani, the 33-year-old socialist who just won the Democratic primary for mayor, is not just a political earthquake shaking New York City — it’s a warning for the rest of America. Backed by Bernie Sanders, AOC, and the Democratic Socialists of America, Mamdani promises free everything, to tax the rich, and to dismantle capitalism. There’s nothing new about this tired strategy, but the media is propping him up as a new political genius. And with Democrat leaders lining up behind him, it’s clear: This radicalism isn’t fringe anymore. It’s the Democratic Party’s future. Mamdani’s rise is part of a larger movement that’s rewriting America’s values. Glenn Beck explains how New York is the prototype for the Left’s socialist makeover of America. Victor Davis Hanson, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Standford, gives a terrifying prediction on Mamdani’s mayoral race chances and warns the revolution is coming for mainstream Democrats. He also dives into MAGA’s frustration with the Trump administration's handling of the Epstein files.

INSIDE Trump’s soul: How a bullet changed his heart forever

“I have a new purpose,” then-candidate Donald Trump told reporter Salena Zito after surviving the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania. Salena joins Glenn Beck to reveal what Trump told her about God, his purpose in life, and why he really said, “Fight! Fight! Fight!”, as she details in her new book, “Butler: The Untold Story of the Near Assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America's Heartland”.

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Salena, congratulations on your book. It is so good.

Just started reading it. Or listening to it, last night.

And I wish you would have -- I wish you would have read it. But, you know, the lady you have reading it is really good.

I just enjoy the way you tell stories.

The writing of this is the best explanation on who Trump supporters are. That I think I've ever read, from anybody.

It's really good.

And the description of your experience there at the edge of the stage with Donald Trump is pretty remarkable as well. Welcome to the program.

SALENA: Thank you, Glenn. Thank you so much for having me.

You know, I was thinking about this, as I was ready to come on. You and I have been along for this ride forever. For what?

Since 2006? 2005?

Like 20 years, right?

GLENN: Yeah. Yeah.

SALENA: And I've been chronicling the American people for probably ten more years, before that. And it's really remarkable to me, as watching how this coalition has grown. Right?

And watching how people have the -- have become more aspirational.

And that's -- and that is what the conservative populist coalition is, right?

It is the aspirations of many, but the celebration of the individual.

And chronicling them, yeah. Has been -- has been, a great honor.

GLENN: You know, I was thinking about this yesterday, when -- when Elon Musk said he was starting another party.

And somebody asked me, well, isn't he doing what the Tea Party tried to do?

No. The Tea Party was not going to start a new party.

It was to -- you know, it was to coerce and convince the Republican Party to do the right thing. And it worked in many ways. It didn't accomplish what we hoped.

But it did accomplish a lot of things.

Donald Trump is a result of the Tea Party.

I truly believe that. And a lot of the people that were -- right?

Were with Donald Trump, are the people that were with the Tea Party.

SALENA: That's absolutely right.

So that was the inception.

So American politics has always had movements, that have been just outside of a party. Or within a party.

That galvanize and broaden the coalition. Right? They don't take away. Or walk away, and become another party.

If anything, if there is a third party out there, it's almost a Republican Party.

Because it has changed in so many viable and meaningful ways. And the Tea Party didn't go away. It strengthened and broadened the Republican Party. Because these weren't just Republicans that became part of this party.

It was independents. It was Democrats.

And just unhappy with the establishment Republicans. And unhappy with Democrats.

And that -- that movement is what we -- what I see today.

What I see every day. What I saw that day, in butler, when I showed I happen at that rally.

As I do, so many rallies, you know, throughout my career. And that one was riveting and changed everything.

GLENN: You made a great case in the opening chapter. You talk about how things were going for Donald Trump.

And how this moment really did change everything for Donald Trump.

Changed the trajectory, changed the mood.

I mean, Elon Musk was not on the Trump train, until this.

SALENA: Yeah.

GLENN: Moment. What do I -- what changed? How -- how did that work?

And -- and I contend, that we would have much more profound change, had the media actually done their job and reported this the way it really was. Pragmatism

SALENA: You know, and people will find this in the book. I'm laying on the ground with an agent on top of me.

I'm 4 feet away from the president.

And there's -- there's notices coming up on my phone. Saying, he was hit by broken glass.

And to this take, that remains part of this sibling culture, in American politics.

Because reporters were -- were so anxious to -- to right what they believed happened.

As opposed to what happened.

And it's been a continual frustration of mine, as a reporter, who is on the ground, all the time.

And I'll tell you, what changed in that moment.

And I say a nuance, and I believe nuance is dead in American journalism.

But it was a nuance and it was a powerful conversation, that I had with President Trump, the next day. He called me the next morning.

But it's a powerful conversation I had with him, just two weeks ago.

When he made this decision to say, fight, fight, fight.

People have put in their heads, why they think he said it. But he told me why he said that. And he said, Salena, in that moment, I was not Donald Trump the man. I was a former president. I was quite possibly going to be president again.

And I had an obligation to the country, and to the office that I have served in, to project strength. To project resolve.

To project that we will not be defeated.

And it's sort of like a symbolic eagle, that is always -- you know, that symbol that we look at, when we think about our country.

He said, that's why I said that. I didn't want the people behind me panicking. I didn't want the people watching, panicking.

I had to show strength. And it's that nuance -- that I think people really picked up on.

And galvanized people.

GLENN: So he told me, when he was laying down on the stage.

And you can hear him. Let me get up. Let me get up.

I've got to get up.

He told me, as I was laying on the stage. I asked him, what were you thinking? What was going through your head? Now, Salena, I don't know about you.

But with me. It would be like, how do I get off the stage? My first was survival.

He said, what was going on through his mind was, you're not pathetic. This is pathetic.

You're not afraid. Get up.

Get up.

And so is that what informed his fight, fight, fight, of that by the time that he's standing up, he's thinking, I'm a symbol? Or do you think he was thinking, I'm a symbol, this looks pathetic. It makes you look weak.

Stand up. How do you think that actually happened?

SALENA: He thinks, and we just talked about this weeks ago. He -- you know, and this is something that he's really thought about.

Right? You know, he's gone over and over and over. And also, purpose and God. Right? These are things that have lingered with him.

You know, he -- he thought, yes.

He did think, it was pathetic that he was on the ground. But he wasn't thinking about, I'm Donald Trump. It's pathetic.

He's thinking, my country is symbolically on the ground. I need to get up, and I need to show that my country is strong.

That our country is resolute.

And I need people to see that.

We can't go on looking like pathetic.

Right?

And I think that then goes to that image of Biden.

GLENN: You have been with so many presidents.

How many presidents do you think that you've personally been with, would have thought that and reacted that way?

SALENA: Probably only Reagan. Reagan would have. Reagan probably would have thought that.

And if you remember how he was out like standing outside.

You know, waving out the window. Right?

After he was shot.

GLENN: At the hospital, right.

SALENA: Had he not been knocked out, unconscious, you know, he probably would have done the same thing.

Because he was someone who deeply believed in American exceptionalism.

And American exceptionalism does not go lay on the ground.

GLENN: And the symbol.

Right. The symbol of the presidency.

SALENA: Yeah. Absolutely. And I think that affects him today.

GLENN: So let me go back to God.

Because you talked to him the next day. And your book Butler.

He calls you up.

I love the fact that your parents would be ashamed of you. On what you said to him.

The language you used. That you just have to read the book.

It's just a great part.

But he calls you the next morning. And wants to know if you're okay.

And you -- you then start talking to him, about God.

And I was -- I was thinking about this, as I was listening to it. You know, Lincoln said, I wasn't -- I wasn't a Christian.

Even though, he was.

I wasn't a Christian, when I was elected. I wasn't a Christian when my son died.

I became a Christian at Gettysburg.

Is -- is -- I mean, I believe Donald Trump always believes in God, et cetera, et cetera.

Do you think there was a real profound change at Butler with him?

SALENA: Absolutely. You know, he called me seven times that day. Seven times, the take after seven.

GLENN: Crazy.

SALENA: Talked about. And I think he was looking for someone that he knew, that was there. And to try to sort it out.

Right? And I let him do most of the talking. I didn't pressure him.

At all. I believed that he was having -- you know, he was struggling. And he needed to just talk. And I believed my purpose was to listen.

Right? I know other reporters would have handled it differently. And that's okay. That's not the kind of reporter that I am.

And I myself was having my own like, why didn't I die?

Right?

Because it went right over my head.

And -- and so I -- he had the conversation about God.

He's funny. I thought it was the biggest mosquito in the world that hit me.

But he had talked profoundly about purpose. You know, and God.

And how God was in that moment.

It --

GLENN: I love the way you -- in the book, I love the way you said that as he's kind of working it out in his own he head.

He was like, you know, I -- I -- I always knew that there was some sort of, you know -- that God was present.

He said, but now that this has happened.

I look back at all of the trials.

All of the tribulations. Literally, the trials.

All of the things that have happened. And he's like, I realized God was there the whole time.

SALENA: Yes. He does. And it's fascinating to have been that witness to history, to have those conversations with him. Because I'm telling you. And y'all know, I can talk. I didn't say much of anything.

I just -- I just listened. I felt that was my purpose, in that moment.

To give him that space, to work it out.

I'm someone that is, you know, believes in God.

I'm Catholic. I followed my faith.

And -- and so, I thought, well, this is why God put me here. Right?

And to -- to have that -- to hear him talk about purpose, to hear him say, Salena. Why did I put a chart down?

I'm like, sir. I don't know. I thought you were Ross Perot for a second.

He never has a chart. And he laughed. And then he said, why did I put that chart down?

By that term, I never turned my head away from people at the rally. That's true.

That relationship is very transactional. It's very -- they feed off of each other.

It's a very emotive moment when you attend a rally. Because he has a way of talking at a rally. That you believe that you are seeing.

And he said, and I never turn my head away.

I never turn my head away.

Why did I turn my head away?

I don't remember consciously thinking about turning my head away. And then he says to me, that was God, wasn't it?

Yes, sir. It was. It was God.

And he said, that's -- that's why I have a new purpose.

And so, Glenn. I think it's important, when you look at the breadth of what has happened, since he was sworn in.

You see that purpose, every day.

He doesn't let up.

He continues going.

And it brings back to the beginning of the book.

Where you find out, that there was another president that was shot at in Butler.

And that was George Washington. And how different the country would have been, had he died in that moment.

And now think about how different the country would be, had President Trump died in that moment. There would be --

GLENN: We're talking to -- we're talking to Salena Zito. About her new book called Butler. The assassination attempt on President Trump. And it is riveting.

And, you know, it is so good. I wish the press would read it. Because it really explains who we are, who Trump supporters are. Who are, you know, red staters. It is so good at that. She's the best at that.