Harrell, who sports a beard and dark cropped hair, now relies on a mobility scooter to get around outside the house. ALS is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. The rate at which ALS progresses varies. Although the mean survival time is three to five years, some people live five, 10 or more years.
Change could come faster at Vanguard, Harrell predicts, now that the connection between asset managers and emissions is more clearly understood. His criticisms of Vanguard are similar to those he levelled against BlackRock, as are his demands, which include supporting climate resolutions.
Tolerating climate change is incompatible with Vanguard’s mission of responsible stewardship of clients’ savings, said Michael Frerichs, state treasurer of Illinois, which has more than $5 billion invested with Vanguard. He said he has raised his concerns and Vanguard has indicated it will be more supportive of climate proposals in the 2021 proxy season.
“Bogle’s vision was to create a safe way for everyday people to invest in the markets for the long term, but there is a real big juxtaposition with how that same company is approaching the existential threat of climate change,’’ said Diana Best, senior strategist at the Sunrise Project in Denver, who works with Harrell on his asset-management campaigns.
Harrell’s activism stretches back to his days at Duke University in the late 1990s, when he was was part of a student group that lobbied against sweatshops and pressed Nike Inc. into disclosing information about the factories where it made university-sponsored sports apparel. He then worked for Greenpeace on campaigns targeting Big Tech companies, including Apple Inc., to remove toxic chemicals from their supply chains and power their data centers with renewable energy.
Harrell joined the Sunrise Project in 2017 to focus on the finance sector and that’s when he discovered BlackRock would be an ideal candidate for an ambitious campaign: It’s a giant money manager led by Chief Executive Officer Larry Fink with a powerful lobbying machine that has friends in governments around the world.
“Larry has a particular `je ne sais quoi’ and sees himself as the CEO of Wall Street in a way that no other asset manager does, and thus we felt BlackRock was the right place to start,” Harrell said. “When BlackRock decides to do something, they go all in and they shift the market.”
Vanguard is different. It promotes itself as closer to Main Street than Wall Street. It’s designed with mom-and-pop investors in mind, is run from a suburb of Philadelphia, not a Manhattan skyscraper, and keeps a comparatively low profile.
If this is to be his swan song, Harrell is going to make it loud. He said the retail campaign that will target Vanguard also is being designed to reach the customers of rival money managers Fidelity Investments, Capital Group Cos. and State Street Global Advisors. There’s also a plan to pressure brokerages Charles Schwab Corp. and E*Trade, as well as app-based investing outfits such as Robinhood Markets Inc. and Stash Investments LLC.
“I am lucky to have a job I love and I hope to do be doing it for a long time, but the reality is I might not,” said Harrell, who has tried a wide range of potential ALS treatments and is currently exploring some experimental options. “And if this is my last campaign, it’s going to be a good one.”
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.