[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 39 (Wednesday, March 1, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S547-S548]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                    Department of Labor Rule Repeal

  Mr. BRAUN. Madam President, I come here today--we are going to vote 
later this afternoon--on something else that involves overreach of the 
Federal Government, and I have witnessed it a lot.
  I have been here just a little over 4 years. I jump in--I come from 
Main Street America--when it just doesn't make sense. The last time I 
was engaged in this was at the tail end of the COVID saga, when a rule 
from the Biden administration was going to force the vaccination on all 
Americans working, if you work for a company down to 100 employees. 
That is a lot of people.
  We weighed in on that. It was bipartisan. The Supreme Court jumped in 
a week and a half or two later and, thank goodness, said enough is 
enough there.
  Here, we are talking about something you hear the acronym, ESG--
environment, social, and governance. In a nutshell, that just means 
now, when we are looking at hard-earned money that you save, your 
retirement--let me tell you how much it is going to impact: $11.7 
trillion, 152 million Americans.
  I really am OK with what you want to invest in, as long as it is 
going to push the best rate of return. Over the long run, if something 
changes, that is different. But, currently, this rule now allows the 
criterion of using those ESG goals, which would be simplified, being 
able to push a certain ideology, a certain point of view, into how 
retirement earnings are invested.
  You have got to remember, this is a fiduciary thing. Most people, 
when they give money to their financial adviser, their broker, you 
would think they would think that it is going to get the best return. 
Bloomberg tracked it. If you would actually invest according to 
ideology over the last few years, it would have been the difference 
between an 8.9-percent return and a 6.3-percent return.
  Imagine trying to explain that in a way where someone trusted that 
you would be doing the best thing with their hard-earned money to get 
the best financial return. That is nearly a 30-percent cut in what you 
would have had otherwise. I have got to believe everybody would be 
thoroughly upset with that.
  It is a step too far. It is injecting the Federal Government, and how 
it has enterprised over the last couple of years, into many different 
arenas. I think it is a wake-up call.
  We are going to vote on this later this afternoon. Everyone will be 
able to, I think, hopefully, vote in a way that they would tell their 
constituents would make sense, give me the best rate of return. Figure 
out all this other stuff here on the legislative floor, but don't make 
it impact hard-earned retirement funds.
  The House just last night passed this in a bipartisan way. Hopefully, 
we will do the same thing later this afternoon. It makes sense to 
Hoosiers. It makes sense to Americans.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Rosen). The Senator from Wyoming.

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