Freedom to Invest in a Sustainable Future Act

[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1119 Introduced in House (IH)]

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118th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 1119

To amend the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to permit 
 retirement plans to consider certain factors in investment decisions.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           February 21, 2023

  Ms. DelBene (for herself, Mr. Casten, Mr. Vargas, and Mr. Phillips) 
 introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on 
                      Education and the Workforce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To amend the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 to permit 
 retirement plans to consider certain factors in investment decisions.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Freedom to Invest in a Sustainable 
Future Act''.

SEC. 2. ERISA AMENDMENTS.

    Subsection (a) of section 404 of the Employee Retirement Income 
Security Act of 1974 (29 U.S.C. 1104) is amended by adding at the end 
the following new paragraph:
    ``(3)(A) Provided that a fiduciary discharges the fiduciary's 
duties with respect to a plan in a manner otherwise consistent with 
this subsection, a fiduciary may--
            ``(i) consider environmental, social, governance, or 
        similar factors, in connection with carrying out an investment 
        decision, strategy, or objective, or other fiduciary act; and
            ``(ii) consider collateral environmental, social, 
        governance, or similar factors as tie-breakers when competing 
        investments can reasonably be expected to serve the plan's 
        economic interests equally well with respect to expected return 
        and risk over the appropriate time horizon.
    ``(B) In a case described in clause (i) or (ii) of subparagraph 
(A), a fiduciary shall not be required to maintain any greater 
documentation, substantiation, or other justification of the 
fiduciary's actions relating to such fiduciary act than is otherwise 
required under this part.
    ``(C) Nothing in this part shall preclude an investment selected in 
accordance with clause (i) or (ii) of subparagraph (A) from being 
treated as a default investment or a component of such a default 
investment (as described in regulations issued by the Secretary under 
subsection (c)(5)(A)), if such investment would otherwise qualify for 
such treatment under such regulations.''.
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