Majority of Shareholders Back Teamsters in Demanding Accountability From FedEx

The International Brotherhood of Teamsters' shareholder proposal offered today at FedEx Corp.'s annual meeting of stockholders received about 46 percent of the votes cast, which represents a majority of the shares cast by outside shareholders.

The proposal sought to change the voting standard to elect directors to the board from the current plurality system to a majority vote system.

"FedEx shareholders want accountability from their elected representatives on the board," said C. Thomas Keegel, Teamsters General Secretary-Treasurer. "The present voting system dangerously insulates board members regardless of their performance."

In response to strong shareholder support, at least 100 companies in the past two years, including Intel, Dell, Motorola, Texas Instruments, Safeway, Home Depot, Gannett and Supervalu, have adopted a similar majority vote standard in company bylaws. Additionally, these companies have adopted director resignation policies in their bylaws or corporate governance policies to address post-election issues related to the status of director nominees that fail to win election.

"We call on the FedEx board to heed shareholders' strong demand for accountability and adopt a majority vote standard for the election of board directors," Keegel said.