Corporate America has spent the past two years in a retreat from diversity, equity and inclusion board mandates.
Goldman Sachs dropped its board diversity policy. Uber eliminated identity-based criteria for filling board seats. Walmart, Amazon, Bank of America, BlackRock, Ford, McDonald’s, Google, and dozens of others have rolled back DEI commitments. Even companies that NLPC negotiated with — American Express, Deere & Company, and Goldman Sachs — agreed to remove discriminatory language from their board candidate selection criteria.
But Colgate-Palmolive refused.
At its May 8, 2026 Annual Meeting, Colgate shareholders will vote on Proposal 4, sponsored by NLPC, which asks the Board to eliminate race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, and other DEI-correlated characteristics from the criteria used to select directors. NLPC has prepared a full exempt solicitation report being circulated to Colgate-Palmolive investors, and an executive summary is available now.
Defying Legal Reality
Colgate’s defiance comes at a moment of maximum legal peril. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has struck down Nasdaq’s board diversity rules, finding no established connection between a board’s racial and gender composition and its governance quality. President Trump’s Executive Order on DEI directs the Attorney General to identify and pursue the most “egregious and discriminatory” DEI practitioners among major corporations. The Department of Justice has already launched False Claims Act investigations into DEI programs at federal contractors, demanding documents from companies including Google and Verizon. And the EEOC has made clear that identity-based selection practices may constitute illegal discrimination.
Colgate has tried to justify its position by pointing to its multinational footprint — arguing that operating in more than 200 countries requires DEI-driven board selection. But Uber operates in more than 70 countries and has already eliminated its commitment to include women and minority candidates when filling board seats. Walmart operates in 19 countries and has moved in the same direction. The multinational argument is a fig leaf, not a governance rationale.
A Board Asleep at the Wheel
NLPC has pressed Colgate-Palmolive on its DEI conduct since 2022, when the company was channeling shareholder funds to Al Sharpton‘s National Action Network. The same board that embraced that spending is now defending identity-based director criteria — while presiding over a company whose financial results are deteriorating.
Colgate reported a 25% collapse in GAAP diluted EPS for 2025, a $794 million after-tax impairment charge tied to its skin health business, and a 3.6% decline in North America net sales in the first quarter of 2025. Over the past 12 months, CL shares have declined roughly 13% while the S&P 500 gained approximately 14% — a gap of nearly 27 percentage points. This is what happens when a board’s attention is in the wrong place.
On May 8, Colgate shareholders have the opportunity to redirect it. NLPC urges a vote FOR Proposal 4.
Read NLPC’s executive summary and full exempt solicitation report on Colgate-Palmolive Proposal 4.
(Image above created via Grok AI)
(Post references PX14A6G Notice of exempt solicitation for 2026 Colgate-Palmolive Company annual meeting)
