On multiple event Mr. Peltz, who’s Jewish, has encountered what he thought-about at the least a whiff of antisemitism. He recalled that his arrival in London within the Nineteen Eighties was greeted with a tabloid profile headlined “The Wild and Rocking World of Nelson Peltz.” The primary sentence, he mentioned, referred to as him a “Jewish boy from Brooklyn,” and the British enterprise institution closed ranks in opposition to him.
Mr. Peltz, lengthy a fierce critic of antisemitism, mentioned he stepped down from his position as chairman of the Simon Wiesenthal Middle in December as a result of after 40 years within the place, it was time for a change. However The Wall Avenue Journal reported that he left after the middle referred to as for a boycott of Ben & Jerry’s. The middle had deemed posts by the corporate’s chairman to be pro-Palestinian after the Hamas assault on Israel. Mr. Peltz is a board member of Unilever, the proprietor of Ben & Jerry’s.
His fellow billionaire Henry Kravis, the buyout pioneer, is without doubt one of the few Jewish members of Palm Seaside’s old-money Everglades Membership, however not Mr. Peltz. Mr. Peltz mentioned he had “refused to set foot” within the membership till it had a Jewish member and, now that it does, has had lunch there a number of instances. (Mr. Peltz belongs to the Palm Seaside Nation Membership, which has lengthy accommodated members excluded from extra restrictive Palm Seaside golf equipment.)
Mr. Peltz’s status as a company troublemaker additionally value him his longtime relationship along with his Manhattan legislation agency, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. In 2019, the agency minimize ties with him despite the fact that he had been one in every of its greatest shoppers for many years. Paul Weiss dealt with his property planning and different issues; a Paul Weiss associate left the agency to develop into his common counsel. However after Paul Weiss expanded its elite company observe lately, the agency advised him that it may not symbolize activist traders, together with him.
Mr. Peltz countered that he wasn’t an activist, he was a “constructivist” — somebody who labored with administration, not in opposition to it. He had by no means mounted a hostile takeover, he mentioned, and even fired a chief govt. Paul Weiss was unpersuaded. “They dropped me like that,” Mr. Peltz mentioned. “I used to be in all probability their oldest dwelling consumer.”
