Hundreds March, Sing, and Pray in Protest at Vanguard’s Headquarters Days Before Salim Ramji Begins as Next CEO

Largest Crowd Yet After Three Years of Climate Change Protests at Vanguard, With Participants from Across North America 

Malvern, PA — Today, hundreds of people converged on the normally quiet Vanguard corporate campus to demand that Vanguard – the world’s largest investor in coal, oil, and gas – invest sustainably. The crowd marched a short distance to the entrance of Vanguard’s campus, with a large banner at the front that read “Invest in Our Communities.” Once at Vanguard, participants sat and stood in and around Vanguard’s driveway, holding the Quaker silent religious service called Meeting for Worship. The crowd of about 300 included people from at least 24 states and 4 countries. In attendance were members of at least 40 Quaker meetings from across North America. 

A large, colorful crowd of people march down a tree-lined street holding banners and signs, including one that says "Invest in our communities"

Photo by Rachael Warriner

The rally featured Denali Nalamalapu from Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights; Hillary Taylor from the movement against the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline; and Zulene Mayfield from Chester Residents Concerned for Quality Living. They each spoke about the incinerators and pipelines near their communities that are Vanguard investments and their work to resist these projects that threatened the health of their families and neighbors. 

“We traveled to Malvern from Appalachia to tell Vanguard about the devastation their investment, the methane gas Mountain Valley Pipeline, is wreaking on our mountains, streams, and planet,” said Denali Nalamalapu, Co-Director of Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights. “The MVP is a reckless, needless project that places Vanguard on the wrong side of history. Vanguard must change course immediately by ceasing the purchase of fossil fuel industry bonds and instead backing a renewable energy future.”

“Vanguard’s support of TotalEnergies for the East African Crude Oil Pipeline is directly fueling large scale displacement of communities, repression of climate activists, and ecocide in Uganda and Tanzania,” said Hillary Taylor, a member of the Ugandan diaspora who participates in the Stop EACOP campaign. “It is a moral imperative for Vanguard and all of its customers to prioritize respect for the environment and human rights. The time is now for Vanguard to divest from fossil fuel investments because being a laggard is unacceptable, inexcusable, and indefensible.” 

“If you don’t think it matters, it does matter. We have beat multi-billion dollar corporations and shut them down,” said Zulene Mayfield, Chairperson of Chester Residents Concerned for Quality Living. “We have to continue to build these bridges; we need to join together and collaborate. My fight is your fight.”

At the protest, event organizers announced that Vanguard customers have moved $40 million dollars out of Vanguard because of its inaction on climate change. That number will continue to grow, until Vanguard makes significant changes with sustainable investing. 

On an outdoor stage covered in red and white banners, two people hold a banner that says "$40 million moved and growing" while another person stands nearby.

Photo by Laran Kaplan

Next week, Vanguard’s new CEO, Salim Ramji, begins his tenure. Campaigners are calling on Ramji and Vanguard leadership to use Vanguard’s influence as a powerful shareholder to push the companies it invests in to do better on climate, and to exit its investments in fossil fuel companies that refuse to transition their businesses to be in alignment with a livable future. 

Vanguard is the world’s largest investor in fossil fuels, with about $270 billion dollars of its customers’ savings in coal, oil, and gas. Past company leadership has refused to take meaningful climate action, lagging behind in the asset management industry by neglecting to engage seriously with portfolio companies on environmental issues and by failing to release plans to decarbonize Vanguard’s investment portfolio in line with a 1.5 degree ceiling on global temperature increase.

The protest was part of Summer of Heat on Wall Street, a months-long series of protests at the offices of largest funders, insurers, and investors in fossil fuels, including Vanguard. Yesterday, activists with Summer of Heat delivered a letter to the New Jersey home of Vanguard board member, Grant Reid, after 78 organizations sent a letter to Vanguard’s Board in May requesting a meeting that has so far gone unanswered. 

Photos and video can be found here.

Contact: Eve Gutman, Earth Quaker Action Team, eve@eqat.org

###