Activist investor Bill Ackman presented in person his board nominees to Target Corp. (TGT) shareholders and members of the media Monday, in a town hall-style question-and-answer session designed to alleviate concerns about his motives for trying to force changes at the retailer.

After recapping his Pershing Square Capital Management's history investing in Target, Ackman introduced and defended his four board nominees, which he says have the "more specialized expertise" that Target needs in retail, credit cards and real estate. Those are the three areas which the hedge-fund manager considers most important to Target. Ackman has also nominated himself for the board. He held the meeting to prove his nominees were independent from him and his firm, and to argue why they were better than Target's slate of four incumbents.

While Ackman continued to say he respects management at the presentation, held in midtown Manhattan, he took the company to task for several things, like management's "stunning" pattern of stock sales. Ackman pointed out that Target management has sold $428.5 million worth of stock the past five years, while buying only $3.8 million worth. Members of the board have also sold more than they've bought in the past five years.

After briefly introducing the four nominees - former Starbucks Corp. (SBUX) and Pathmark Stores Inc. (PTMK) Chief Executive Jim Donald, credit-card industry veteran Richard Vague, real-estate investor Michael Ashner and corporate-governance expert Ron Gilson - Ackman went one-by-one pitting each nominee against a specific Target board member up for re-election, pointing out why his nominees were better.

"This board reminds me of a 'friend of Bob - Bob Ulrich' - board," Ackman said, referring to Target's former CEO. Not having real-estate, retail or credit card experts, he said, puts Target at a disadvantage against competitors that do, like Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT).

While the meeting was designed for investors and the media to ask questions of the nominees themselves, most questions were directed at Ackman, who steered his answers back to the nominees so they could answer individually. At times, Ackman appeared to be a journalist himself, interviewing his nominees. At one point, he joked that Donald was nominated just as much for the mistakes he made as his successes, something he had said on CNBC earlier Monday, with Donald by his side.

Most of the non-Ackman questions came for Donald about retail and groceries, and Gilson about corporate governance. Gilson at one point got a chance to defend the nominees' independence from Ackman, responding to a question of whether he was concerned about Pershing Square's motives as a hedge-fund manager.

"The people who are going to be in the boardroom other than Bill aren't Pershing Square," Gilson said, adding that if the nominees are elected, Pershing Square's stake will be irrelevant. In fact, Ackman joked that while he wants at least the other four elected, he understands if shareholders rejected him as a director if they disliked "hedge funds or derivatives," though he pointed out that current Target board members also own options.

Pershing Square started investing in Target in 2007, when the stock traded in the $60s. Since then, he has tried to get the company to get out of the credit-card business - Target wound up cutting some but not all of its exposure - and to spin off the property under its stores as a real estate investment trust, something the company rejected.

Ackman said Monday that while Target asked Goldman Sachs to review the Pershing Square real-estate transaction, he believes the company didn't explore any real-estate options other than his.

Still, he said, "This is not about a real-estate slate," something the company has said is his key motivation for gaining board seats.

In fact, he tried to deemphasize the importance of his real-estate plan, saying multiple times that he wasn't as concerned with his real-estate plan as he was some exploration of Target's real-estate assets. He also conceded that the company's credit-ratings are very important, something that he didn't emphasize when he was making his credit-risky real-estate proposal.

Other points of contention include Ackman's desire for a universal proxy card, which would allow Target shareholders to pick and choose from both his and Target's nominees without having to attend the company's annual shareholder meeting. The point was similar to one made by fellow activist investor Nelson Peltz on CNBC's "Squawk Box," which Ackman served as guest host of Monday morning.

"It's just like ordering from a Chinese restaurant: some from column A, some from column B," Ackman said during the shareholder presentation, echoing almost verbatim Peltz's point from CNBC.

Ackman also said Target didn't seriously consider Vague and Ashner when he previously nominated them to the board, before the proxy fight.

"The board has spent less time with Richard Vague and Michael Ashner than you have," Ackman said to the audience.

Pershing Square owns 7.8% of Target's outstanding shares through stock and options. Public presentations regarding companies he invests in have become common for Ackman. The podium from which he spoke was even adorned with Pershing Square's diamond logo.

New York-based Pershing Square, which Ackman founded in 2003, has more than $5 billion under management in a concentrated portfolio. The company is currently involved in the bankruptcy of General Growth Properties, and is a large investor in Borders Group Inc. (BGP).

Target shares recently traded up 31 cents at $43.48. Shares up more than 25% this year.

-By Joseph Checkler, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-4297; joseph.checkler@dowjones.com