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tiaDespite having built a reputation based on commitment to shareholder democracy, TIAA- CREF asked the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) to bar its shareholders from seeing and voting on the shareholder proposal, arguing that the proposal is unnecessary, as it already has a human rights investment policy and would unduly interfere with daily business operationsIn a sharply-worded response filed on behalf of Jewish Voice for Peace, attorney Paul M. Neuhauser noted that the SEC has consistently treated just such human rights proposals not as interference with daily business, but as “significant policy issues” that shareholders are entitled to review and vote on.

that the proposal is not unnecessary, given TIAA-CREF’s failure to act in any way on its human rights policy except to comply with the government-mandated boycott against the Sudan; that proposals “concerning human rights abuses in the Occupied Territories” are not misleading, but instead have already been ruled by the SEC to raise significant policy issues; and that the resolution asks TIAA-CREF only to engage in the very sort of “quiet diplomacy” that is its preferred approach, where “there is not one iota of evidence that CREF has actually engaged in any ‘quiet diplomacy’ with respect to the issue at hand.” Aaron Levitt, TIAA-CREF participant, “Our resolution asks TIAA-CREF to engage with companies that profit from the Israeli occupation, to ask them to change course or face divestment next year. We think it’s reasonable, fair, and takes an important stand for justice.”

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