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An Open Letter Exchange with The Vanguard Group on For-profit Prison Conditions – Raise the Voices

To: Vanguard Media Relations

Good morning,

Are you divested from Core Civic and other types of corporations profiting from immigrant detention centers yet? I am aware that CoreCivic is not one of the CBP centers, but other types of centers.

Could you please read this, https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/migrant-boy-describes-harsh-conditions-at-yuma-border-detention-64327237941 [msnbc.com] ?

From: Vanguard Media Relations

Thank you for writing to share your perspectives on immigrant detention centers at private prison companies such as CoreCivic. Vanguard’s investment stewardship team monitors key governance risks to companies held in Vanguard funds. On behalf of the funds, we vote proxies and meet with company leaders to ensure proper governance.

We do not believe divestment of our funds’ interests in portfolio companies involved in this or other issues is a solution. The funds’ investment in a company enables Vanguard to have a voice and a vote on the company’s governance and its oversight of key risks.

While it is our policy not to discuss our views on specific companies, please know that we have received your perspective and can incorporate it into our analysis and oversight of the companies’ governance practices in the future.

Thank you again for your letter. We will continue to engage with the companies we invest in to advocate for what is in the best long-term shareholder interest.

To: Vanguard Media Relations

Vanguard’s holds an enormous 15.01% stake in CoreCivic which not only reaps the company profit but allows it, as a shareholder, to conduct “oversight of key risks”. With the current state of for-profit prisons, Vanguard then is not appropriately fulfilling its duty as a shareholder as it idly watches CoreCivic build its business employing $1/day inmate labor and providing insufficient medical care resulting in deaths of inmates. In addition to the deplorable conditions its detainees face, CoreCivic heavily lobbies for higher incarceration rates. This plainly portrays that your company is willing to profit from expanding the private prison systems regardless of the harm that they cause.

We urge Vanguard to divest from the for profit prison corporation and stop using their innocent customers’ pensions to fund traumatizing family separation efforts. Associating with CoreCivic not only funds morally corrupt detention centers, but aligns Vanguard with the xenophobic intolerance that characterises President Trump’s family separation policy.

https://about.vanguard.com/investment-stewardship/portfolio-company-resources/common-questions.html

https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/06/us/jail-health-care-ccs-invs/

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/25/private-prison-companies-served-with-lawsuits-over-usng-detainee-labor

https://www.newsweek.com/border-crisis-racism-private-prisons-campaign-donations-1451596

Thank you for engaging in this extremely critical conversation. Vanguard has the power to impact many lives by your decisions.

– RaiseTheVoices

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