What’s the story?
As of May 31, shareholders did not approve any proposals either in favor of or opposition to ESG-related topics during the 2026 proxy season. That’s according to a report summarizing the 2026 shareholder season published by the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance which identified 135 ESG-related proposals that shareholders voted on.
Why does it matter?
The report found that around 38% of the 135 proposals were anti-ESG and received an average vote in favor of about 1.7%. On the other side, 62% of proposals supported ESG-related actions or disclosures and had an average vote in favor of about 13.3%. A pro-ESG climate-related proposal received the most support of any of the proposals, but still failed to pass with 47% support.
Among anti-ESG proposals, the report found that:
This proxy season, proposals seemed to focus on three main areas: risk of negative impacts of certain charitable giving, risk of misalignment between a company’s values and those of its customers or viewpoint discrimination against customers, and risks of religious discrimination against employees.
The 2026 shareholder season also brought a rise in anti-ESG proposals related to healthcare and reproductive rights (13% of anti-ESG proposals), such as asking companies about risks related to distributing mifepristone or related to providing gender-affirming care within employee benefits packages.
In total, three shareholders were responsible for more than 60% of the anti-ESG proposals in 2026. The report concluded that shareholder support for anti-ESG proposals remains low, but that it appears “activist shareholders view these proposals as a way to draw attention to their views and objectives, even in the absence of widespread support.”
What’s the background?
The 2026 shareholder voting season is the first since a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) decision to not provide substantive guidance on the exclusion of shareholder proposals from proxy ballots under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.
The change shifted more responsibility for exclusion decisions from SEC staff to companies. Instead of receiving the agency’s usual no-action responses, companies had to decide for themselves whether proposals could be omitted from proxy materials under SEC rules.
A mid-season analysis by Glass Lewis, a proxy advisory firm, found that companies are excluding significantly fewer shareholder proposals in 2026. As announced, the policy change applied only to the 2025-2026 proxy season.
A report from Root Intelligence found that the number of ESG-related proposals peaked at 322 in 2023. Support for pro-environmental and social proposals peaked in 2021, according to Institutional Shareholder Services. Shareholders have never approved an anti-ESG proposal according to the Harvard's Forum on Corporate Governance.
Read more about shareholder voting here.
