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By Marni Rose McFall
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Ben Cohen, the co-founder of ice cream company Ben & Jerry’s, has called for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to be defunded and disbanded in a recent social media post, following the shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
“This is the beginning of the end of the land of the free,” Cohen said.
Newsweek contacted Ben & Jerry’s via email outside of normal working hours for comment.
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Why It Matters
The shootings of Good, a 37-year-old mother of three and Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse, by federal agents have sparked waves of protests across the country and calls for ICE to be defunded and abolished.
The federal government has been at the center of public backlash, and faces a plummeting approval rating for its immigration policy, which has in turn forced the White House to make a rare climbdown and reassess its deployment of ICE and Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis.
Both Cohen and his fellow co-founder, Jerry Greenfield, have long been outspoken over politics, speaking out over issues like the wars in Gaza and Ukraine. Greenfield announced in 2025 that he was quitting Ben & Jerry’s and accused its parent company, Unilever, of breaking promises guaranteeing the brand's independence.
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What To Know
In a post on X on January 27, Cohen said that he had been intending to make an ice cream specifically to memorialize Good, but changed his mind after Pretti’s death.
Speaking in a video in a post, which has been viewed over 900,000 times as of reporting, he said, “Alex [Pretti’s] murder makes it clear that the murder of Renee [Good] and the government's lies were not a mistake, but standard operating procedure, I just don’t have it within me.”
“We all live in Minneapolis now. Because Minneapolis is only the beginning of what they have in mind,” he continued.
Cohen went on to speak about the founding of ICE, highlighting that it is a relatively new organization. This is something that has been prominent in social media discourse in recent weeks, with critics of the agency arguing that, as the organization was brought in relatively recently, America could either do without it or go back to how things were before.
Cohen expressed this sentiment and said, “ICE must be defunded and disbanded. Before 2001, ICE did not even exist. Immigration used to be handled by the INS, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which was part of the Department of Justice, and it was just. Let’s go back to that,” Cohen said.
There was a mixed response from social media users to the post, with some supporting Cohen’s message and thanking him for speaking out, while others criticized him and said they would avoid buying the brand, which is something that has happened previously in response to the Ben & Jerry’s founders speaking out about politics.
What People Are Saying
Ben Cohen, speaking in the video shared to X: “This is not freedom. This is not the right to free speech or the right to protest. This is not America. This is sheer cruelty. This is the beginning of the end of the land of the free. Unless we make it the home of the brave.”
What Happens Next?
The ongoing backlash against ICE has seen its authority questioned across the political spectrum. There are congressional fights over Department of Homeland Security funding, which have in turn boosted the odds of a government shutdown, and impeachment efforts against Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem. As backlash continues, it is unclear how the fallout will develop.
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