Consumers Defense is the advocacy arm of Consumers’ Research, one of the primary players in the Right’s manufactured crisis of “woke capitalism” and its embrace of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investment standards, along with diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
“We needed a vehicle by which we could be very explicit in the ways in which consumers’ interests should be protected from ESG,” said Will Hild, executive director of Consumers’ Research, in an interview with Politico a few days after the spinoff was founded in 2022. Its initial efforts have been focused on tracking ESG legislation in various states, promoting model bills restricting ESG practices, and funding anti-ESG groups such as Heritage Action.
In its founding year, Consumers Defense invested all of its financial resources on “educational efforts,” including creating a website, publishing an ESG legislation tracker, drafting and sharing of model legislation, and distributing $100,000 in grants to “other organizations”—namely Heritage Action. Hild has said in an interview that the advocacy spinoff aims to operate with an $8-million budget, similar in size to that of its parent organization.
Operatives
- Executive Director Will Hild
Core Financials
- Total revenue: $175,153
- Total expenses: $118,194
- Net assets: $56,959
Source: 2022 IRS 990 Filing
For more information, visit the Consumers Defense page on SourceWatch.