Report: Unilever cuts funding for Ben & Jerry’s foundation as it audits giving to progressive and pro-Palestinian causes
Executives, ahead of a planned spinoff, say the ice cream maker wasn’t sharing audit documents
A view of the Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream factory and corporate headquarters. (John Greim/LightRocket via Getty Images)
(JTA) — Ben & Jerry’s parent company Unilever is cutting off millions in funding to the ice cream company’s charitable foundation after a probe begun in part due to the company’s donations to pro-Palestinian organizations, according to Semafor.
Unilever, ahead of plans to spin off Ben & Jerry’s along with its other ice cream brands, says the ice cream maker was impeding an audit of the foundation, which funds hundreds of left-leaning groups.
Peter ter Kulve, who runs Unilever’s ice cream business, told Ben & Jerry’s executives in an email seen by Semafor that the foundation’s trustees “have continued to resist basic oversight” and allegedly refused to provide audit documents.
“It represents a marked departure from the norms of charitable organizations, for whom transparency is typically a bedrock operating principle,” ter Kulve wrote.
The Ben & Jerry’s foundation distributed more than $5 million of Unilever’s money in 2022, according to Semafor. The audit focused in part on its grants to pro-Palestinian groups, including the Oakland Institute, a California-based nonprofit whose founder is a trustee of the Ben and Jerry’s Foundation.
The company, founded but no longer owned by two progressive Jews, has long wed the ice cream business to its left-wing politics. The cut to Ben & Jerry’s charitable donations marks the latest in a saga of tensions between the ice cream company and Unilever which escalated in 2021 when Ben & Jerry’s announced that it would stop selling its desserts in “Occupied Palestinian Territory.” Last month, the board of Ben & Jerry’s called Israel’s war in Gaza a “genocide” in a statement.
In April, Ben & Jerry’s co-founder Ben Cohen attempted to gather investors for a potential buy-back of the company ahead of its spin-off, but Unilever rebuffed Cohen’s efforts, saying that it would not sell Ben & Jerry’s as a stand-alone business.
The dispute over the ice cream company’s progressive stances ended up in Manhattan federal court in March when Ben & Jerry’s accused Unilever of axing its CEO Dave Stever over the brand’s social activism.
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