About TAGS - Taxpayers Against Genocide in Sudan

Our Mission

We are a coalition of dedicated California taxpayers, teachers, retirees, and beneficiaries of the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS). Our mission is simple: to ensure the CalSTRS Board of Administration fulfills its constitutional fiduciary duty to protect and preserve our retirement funds by immediately mitigating documented, catastrophic geopolitical risks.

We believe the Board must adhere to the Prudent Expert Rule, which requires the highest standard of care, skill, and diligence—especially when managing money that affects the financial future of hundreds of thousands of Californians.

The Core Problem: A Failure to Govern

In 2022, CalSTRS suffered a catastrophic and total loss of approximately $1.5 billion when Russia froze the Fund’s assets following international sanctions. This was not a normal market fluctuation; it was a total loss caused by the failure of the Board to adequately govern and preemptively mitigate a known, specific geopolitical risk—the sovereign asset freeze.

Despite this devastating precedent, the Board has failed to adopt a specific, binding Geopolitical Sanctions Risk Mitigation Policy. This failure means our funds remain exposed to an identical, unmitigated risk in other high-risk jurisdictions.

The Immediate Risk: The UAE

Today, the Fund holds significant exposure in jurisdictions like the United Arab Emirates (UAE), a nation explicitly flagged by international bodies for its role in facilitating sanctions evasion and illicit financial activity. This exposure carries the same, high risk of a total asset freeze that led to the $1.5 billion loss in Russia. The Board’s ongoing inaction is an unacceptable breach of trust.

Our Legal Action: Mandating Prudence

We are pursuing a Class Action Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief in the California Superior Court. Our goal is not just to complain, but to mandate a concrete, legal solution.

The lawsuit seeks to:

Declare a Breach: Obtain a court ruling that the Board’s failure to act immediately after the Russian loss is a formal breach of the Prudent Expert Rule.
Mandate a New Policy: Compel the Board to create and implement an objective, non-discretionary risk policy that uses independent, third party metrics (like FATF designations) to flag and divest from high-risk geopolitical investments.
Force Divestment: Ensure this new, legally binding policy is immediately applied to all current high-risk holdings, thereby forcing the necessary divestment from jurisdictions like the UAE.

We are fighting for governance, prudence, and the security of every teacher’s retirement. Join us in holding the CalSTRS Board accountable to the highest standard the California Constitution demands.