Professor Bainbridge—
Regarding your post on whether left-wing CEO activists will be sued by plaintiffs’ attorneys—my question is, where are the Republican AGs and state officeholders? Democrats are already quite active in this area, particularly through their control of state pension funds that act as ready-made plaintiffs.
- The New York State Comptroller (sole trustee of the common retirement fund) has pursued Oracle in a 220 action to get information on political donations: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-oracle-lawsuit-politics-idUSKCN0SM2J220151028
- CEI is being subpoenaed as part of the Exxon investigation, again brought by state AGs: http://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-04-08/subpoenaed-into-silence-on-global-warming
Republicans, meanwhile, haven’t developed an extensive network of entrepreneurial law firms that will take a flyer on novel legal theories. The relationship between state pension funds and the plaintiffs’ bar also suggests why you’re more likely to see a derivative lawsuit alleging conservative bias in a CEO long before you get a lawsuit against the people you mention. It’s not just that some plaintiffs’ attorneys are themselves liberal—suing a CEO who is a liberal activist might be against the interests of their biggest clients.
The trouble is that this is an ecosystem, and conservatives keep treating the problem as a series of isolated incidents.
