1792 Insights
The 1792 Exchange is committed to delivering sharp, data-driven analysis of corporate America’s political entanglements. Discover what investors, executives, and concerned citizens should know regarding why businesses should return to neutral, mission-focused operations.
DEI Starbucks: A Breakpoint Between Better Business and Business Ends
Starbucks’ recent resolution of the lawsuit brought by the Florida Attorney General only scratches the surface of the business risks created by subordinating core operations to ideological priorities. Florida employees and applicants reported “feeling excluded or humiliated because they were White,” alleging that the company had effectively converted hiring and recruiting into a process that favored preferred demographic groups. The settlement, under which Starbucks agreed to forgo race- and sex-based goals, quotas, and preferences companywide, underscores that such practices carry both legal exposure and internal costs, even when the company does not admit liability. The deeper question is why these commitments became central in the first place. In Greenfield, Massachusetts, Last Ditch Bar and Arts Venue supplies a clear, small-scale illustration of the consequences. Last Ditch built its model around ideological priorities, one notable being an expansive open-door policy intended to accommodate a particular activist customer base. When financial pressures led the owners to make a limited operational adjustment- a one night a week deal to help the business make more money. Like a late Starbucks open-door policy. The bar advocated and accommodated everyone. What happened? The “advocate community,” the business’ main customer base, only tore the business apart. All …
New Heritage Report Highlights Risks of Corporate Alignment With the Human Rights Campaign
Last week, The Heritage Foundation released a very important report detailing the risks companies face from affiliating with the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and its Corporate Equality Index (CEI). The report provides valuable insight into the scope of HRC’s influence on corporate America and the organizations pushing back against it. Any institution concerned about the growing influence of modern gender ideology should familiarize itself with these findings. In short, the CEI pressures companies to incorporate gender ideology into nearly every aspect of corporate governance, including employee healthcare benefits, charitable giving, and marketing. Its influence likely contributed to the controversial Bud Light and Target marketing decisions in 2023. Fortune 500 CEI participation dropped 65% this year, marking its first significant decline. However, according to Inspire Investing and the 1792 Exchange, there are still 242 publicly traded companies with a Verified 100 on the 2026 CEI, indicating coverage of transgender medical interventions for minors. Furthermore, 40 companies remain corporate partners of the HRC, including T-Mobile. This raises questions about T-Mobile’s pledge last year to the Federal Communications Commission that its approach to external organizations is “driven by [its] desire to advance [its] core business objectives.” Another corporate partner is Dell Technologies, which …
Berkeley set out to defend DEI — and found no financial upside
A new study meant to reassure corporations about diversity, equity, and inclusion programs has delivered an awkward finding for DEI advocates: Keeping the programs produced no measurable financial advantage over abandoning them. Researchers at the University of California in Berkeley compared S&P 500 companies that maintained DEI after President Trump’s January 2025 executive order with companies that scaled back their commitments. Firms that kept their programs performed about as well in stock returns and revenue as those that retreated. The authors and sympathetic news coverage emphasized the other half of that result: Companies could keep DEI without suffering a significant financial penalty. CBS News framed the finding that way, as did a subsequent Forbes analysis. But the conclusion cuts both ways. If companies paid no price for keeping DEI, they also paid no price for dropping it. For investors, that raises a straightforward question: Where is the financial return from DEI? The full article can be read in The Blaze.
Corporate stewardship, the cost of ideological activism, and the trust that built America.
In this episode of The WallBuilders Show, Doug Napier, Executive Chairman and CEO of 1792 Exchange, joined host Rick Green to discuss The American Company, 1792 Exchange’s new effort to define and celebrate companies that act American. The conversation explores what separates a patriotic company from one that only waves the flag, and how Americans can help recognize the companies doing it right. Key Topics Discussed:
Accenture said it ditched DEI. The DOJ just caught them running secret race scorecards
Color-coded monthly dashboards. Separate promotion conversations for candidates who moved demographic numbers in the “right” direction. Leadership programs with the door closed to the “wrong” race or sex. These are just a few of the flashing indicators that companies who should have known better had nonetheless embraced illegal employment practices. The avoidable result was the payment of huge fines. IBM paid $17 million. Deloitte paid $21.5 million. Now Accenture agreed to pay $25 million to resolve Justice Department allegations that it did the same things, while certifying it did not in order to continue its collection of big bucks from taxpayers. Three of the largest consulting firms — companies selling “expert” advice to government and Fortune 500 clients on workplace “transformation” — have written checks totaling $63.5 million in a single year under the Civil Rights Fraud Initiative. That’s a pattern. And a problem. The DOJ alleged that since 2017, Accenture Federal Services treated race and sex as factors in hiring and promotions to hit “stealth” workforce composition goals. Business-unit leaders received monthly summaries of the exact percentage of each race and sex in their units, highlighted to show if they were on target. Those scorecards drove improper hiring decisions, …
Berkeley Study Finds No Financial Upside to Maintaining DEI
A new Berkeley study, Markets Do Not Punish Firms for Maintaining DEI, examines whether S&P 500 companies that maintained diversity, equity, and inclusion programs after the Trump administration’s January 2025 DEI executive order suffered financially compared with companies that rolled them back. The authors conclude that companies maintaining DEI performed “just as well” in stock-market returns and revenue, arguing that businesses can resist federal pressure on DEI without suffering significant financial consequences. But the inverse is equally important for corporate leaders: companies that rolled back DEI also performed just as well. The study found no statistically significant stock-market or revenue advantage from maintaining DEI across its various measures of corporate commitment. That finding is notable given longstanding claims that DEI improves financial performance. If particular DEI practices create shareholder value, companies should be able to identify which DEI practices increase shareholder value and at what point benefits begin to diminish. The study also captures only part of the risk environment. Its revenue analysis extends through July 2025, before several major federal enforcement actions involving allegedly discriminatory employment practices. IBM, Deloitte, and Accenture have since agreed to settlements totaling more than $63 million, while Nike has faced separate EEOC scrutiny. The Berkeley …