Mueller Water Products, Inc.

Rating Overview

Mueller Water Products, Inc. is Medium Risk.

Mueller Water Products is Medium Risk. The company often yields to political activism in shaping corporate governance, potentially alienating consumers, dividing employees, and harming shareholders. Mueller Water Products implements race and identity-based policies that replace merit, excellence, and integrity with preferential treatment and outcomes. The company occasionally embraces corporate initiatives that redirect its central focus from business goals to partisan policies and divisive issues at times. This approach fails to safeguard free exercise, free speech, and free enterprise.

Rating Criteria

Corporate Weaponization Risk Levels
Criteria	Risk Level
Cancellations	Medium Risk
Discriminatory Philanthropy	Lower Risk
Employment Protection	High Risk

Corporate Weaponization ⓘ

Corporate Governance and Public Policy Risk Levels
Criteria	Risk Level
Advocacy Bias	High Risk
Funding	Lower Risk
Political Actions	Lower Risk

Corporate Governance and Public Policy ⓘ

Rating Criteria Detail

Criteria Risk Level Rationale

Corporate Weaponization

Criteria:

Has canceled customers, suppliers, or vendors due to their political views or religious beliefs OR corporately boycotts, divests, or sanctions regions, people groups, or industries.

Risk Level:

Medium

Rationale:

Mueller Water Products integrates ESG into its executive compensation. From its 2023 ESG Report: “Mueller’s executive compensation plan includes several ESG-related operational goals, including safety, energy consumption and water withdrawal, encouraging accountability and ownership of ESG initiatives. In 2023, as in past years, 10% of executive bonuses were tied to ESG metrics, an example of how ESG performance is tied to compensation” (1). The company promotes divisive sex and gender policies. Its Supplier Code of Conduct requires international vendors to include sexual orientation and gender identity in their nondiscrimination policy (2). However, Mueller Water Products has not canceled customers, suppliers, or vendors based on political views or religious beliefs (3).

Criteria:

Charitable giving (including employee matching programs) policies or practices discriminate against charitable organizations based on views or religious beliefs.

Risk Level:

Lower

Rationale:

Mueller Water Products does not discriminate against charitable organizations based on views or beliefs (1).

Criteria:

Employment policies fail to protect against viewpoint or other discrimination and/or are ideological in nature.

Risk Level:

High

Rationale:

Mueller Water Products offers unconscious bias training to its employees (1). The company appears to prioritize diversity over merit in its recruitment. From its 2023 ESG Report: “Our talent acquisition process includes marketing jobs to diverse candidate pools, posting open roles to a wide range of recruiting websites, including several that focus on diversity, as well as encouraging referrals from current employees for underrepresented groups” (2). Mueller Water Products operates a supplier diversity program. “Our commitment to diversity extends to suppliers. We evaluate new and existing suppliers for diversity using a third-party vendor that allows each supplier to identify whether its business is certified or qualified as a diverse, small or other government-rated business. Mueller also aims to increase purchases from existing diverse vendors where possible” (3). The company does not provide viewpoint protections for its employees (4).

Corporate Governance and Public Policy

Criteria:

Uses corporate reputation to support causes, organizations, or policies hostile to freedom of expression.

Risk Level:

High

Rationale:

Mueller Water Products supports DEI within its business practices, hosting a DEI Council (1). The company supports DEI within its business practices. From its 2023 ESG Report: “Mueller is a proud member of the Diversity & Inclusion Council of the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity & Innovation (MAPI) , which is a non-profit manufacturing leadership network that offers benchmarking, professional development and research services” (2). Mueller Water Products supports ESG within its business practices. From its ESG webpage: “Our ESG commitment drives us to innovate sustainably, foster a diverse and inclusive culture, and uphold the highest standards of governance” (3).

Criteria:

Uses corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies hostile to freedom of expression.

Risk Level:

Lower

Rationale:

Mueller Water Products has not used corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies (1).

Criteria:

Uses corporate political actions and/or financial contributions for ideological, non-business purposes.

Risk Level:

Lower

Rationale:

Mueller Water Products does not operate a PAC at this time and has not used its lobbying for ideological purposes (1)(2)(3).