The Last Holdout: Colgate-Palmolive's Defiant Stand for DEI
While virtually every major corporation in America has spent the past two years quietly retreating from diversity, equity, and inclusion mandates, one familiar brand is digging in its heels: Colgate-Palmolive. The maker of Colgate toothpaste, Palmolive dish soap, and Irish Spring soap has become something of a museum exhibit for corporate wokeness — a relic of the DEI era that refuses to admit the era is over.
The National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) filed a shareholder proposal for Colgate's May 8, 2026 Annual Meeting asking the board to eliminate race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, and other DEI-correlated characteristics from its director selection criteria. Colgate's response? Defiance.
That defiance is costing shareholders dearly — and it should cost Colgate your grocery dollars too.
Who Else Has Moved On?
To understand how stubborn Colgate's position is, consider what the rest of Corporate America has done. Goldman Sachs eliminated its board diversity policy after NLPC negotiations. Uber axed identity-based criteria for filling board seats. Walmart, Amazon, Bank of America, BlackRock, Ford, McDonald's, and Google have all rolled back DEI commitments. Even American Express and Deere & Company agreed to remove discriminatory language from board candidate criteria.
But Colgate refused.
The company's excuse? It operates in more than 200 countries, and therefore "requires" DEI-driven board selection to navigate global complexities. It's a breathtaking argument. Uber operates in 70+ countries and has already eliminated its DEI board commitments. Walmart operates in 19 countries and did the same. The multinational fig leaf isn't a governance rationale — it's a smokescreen for ideological commitment.
The Woke Profile: What Colgate Is Actually Doing
Colgate's DEI posture isn't just about board composition. The company has a documented history of funneling shareholder money into activist organizations. NLPC has been pressing Colgate since 2022, when it was discovered the company was channeling funds to Al Sharpton's National Action Network — one of the most divisive political operations in America. The same board that signed those checks is now fighting to keep identity-based director criteria baked into company policy.
Colgate has an ESG rating program, an aggressive "sustainability" agenda, and has publicly committed to gender pay equity audits — the kind of top-down ideological compliance infrastructure that signals a company more focused on political optics than product excellence. Its 2025 proxy statement doubled down on "inclusion and belonging" as a core board competency, the kind of language that treats ideology as a qualification.
The Financial Wreckage
Here's what makes Colgate's DEI stand particularly hard to defend: the company is performing terribly.
- GAAP diluted EPS collapsed 25% in 2025
- The company absorbed a $794 million after-tax impairment charge tied to its skin health business
- North America net sales declined 3.6% in the first quarter of 2025
- CL shares fell approximately 13% over the past 12 months — while the S&P 500 gained 14%, a gap of nearly 27 percentage points
This is the predictable result when a board is more concerned with achieving demographic targets than achieving business results. Shareholders are getting crushed while executives virtue signal. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has already struck down Nasdaq's board diversity rules, finding no established connection between a board's racial and gender composition and its governance quality. Colgate is fighting to preserve a practice a federal court just declared legally indefensible.
Legal Jeopardy: Playing with Fire
Colgate isn't just fighting a PR battle — it's fighting a legal one it will likely lose. 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. The EEOC has made clear that identity-based selection practices may constitute illegal employment discrimination.
Colgate is choosing to remain in the crosshairs of federal enforcement while its stock tanks and its earnings crater. That's not bold leadership. That's ideological capture at the executive level.
What You Can Do: Vote With Your Wallet
Colgate-Palmolive owns a sprawling portfolio of everyday brands that most Americans use without thinking. Colgate toothpaste. Palmolive dish soap. Irish Spring. Softsoap. Tom's of Maine. Ajax. Speed Stick. These are products sitting in your bathroom and under your kitchen sink right now.
Every purchase is a vote. And right now, buying Colgate products is voting to fund a company that actively resists returning to merit-based hiring, fights against its own shareholders, and clings to an ideological agenda that is failing everyone — including itself.
The good news? Alternatives exist. In the oral health category, brands like Smile Sciences (Woke Score: 4/100), Wonder Oral Wellness (Woke Score: 4/100), and Grove Dental (Woke Score: 4/100) offer woke-free options. For personal care, Melaleuca (Woke Score: 5/100) is a solid choice that builds its business on product merit, not political theater.
The Bottom Line
Colgate-Palmolive had every opportunity to follow the rest of Corporate America and quietly drop its DEI board criteria. Companies like Goldman Sachs and American Express did it. Uber did it. Even McDonald's did it. Instead, Colgate's board chose to dig in — and they're asking their shareholders and customers to absorb the consequences of that choice.
The May 8, 2026 Annual Meeting will be a watershed moment. NLPC's Proposal 4 gives shareholders the chance to demand a merit-based board. But you don't have to wait until May. You can vote today by switching your oral care and household products to brands that actually respect their customers.
Check Colgate's full woke profile — and discover better alternatives — right here on BuyWokeFree.com. Your toothbrush shouldn't come with a political agenda.