September 24, 2025
Highlights:
The Private Equity Stakeholder Project (PESP) claims to be a “nonprofit watchdog” that exists to hold private equity accountable, but a recent blog post suggests that it holds one standard for political opponents and another for allies.
Earlier this month, PESP published a piece harshly criticizing President Trump’s Deputy Secretary of War, Steve Feinberg, founder of private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management. In the piece, PESP warns that Feinberg’s career in private equity industry presented threats involving privatization military healthcare.
PESP concludes that Feinberg’s appointment “underscore[s] the dangers of entrusting critical public systems – from civilian hospitals to military healthcare – to executives with deep private equity ties.”
One might wonder, then, if PESP issued similar warnings when former President Joe Biden appointed individuals with “deep private equity ties” to top cabinet positions in his administration. Of course this “nonprofit watchdog” did not.
In fact, Biden’s top two national security appointees – Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and Secretary of State Tony Blinken – were actually partners at Pine Island Capital Partners, a private equity firm that sought to purchase military contractors, at the time of their appointment. Reporting at the time from The New York Times indicated that they were involved with the firm “because of their connections, the company made clear as it promoted itself in recent months in advance of selling $218 million in stock to prepare to buy other defense industry targets.”
A review of PESP’s website for the terms “Blinken” and “Lloyd Austin” yields zero results, as did a search on its X account. Further, in recent months, PESP’s credibility taken some hits. This past August, a Washington Examiner investigation found that the nonprofit engaged in a transactional relationship with the Office and Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU), wherein the labor union paid PESP to produce organizing and advocacy materials that failed to include any disclosure of a financial transaction.