Ben & Jerry’s has called on the US to provide back “stolen Indigenous land” including Mount Rushmore — and now a Native American chief in Vermont said he’d wish to talk in regards to the land that’s under the ice cream maker’s headquarters.
The “Chunky Monkey” maker — which previously has waded into controversies around Israel and Palestine — divided customers this week with a July 4 tweet that said: “The US was founded on stolen indigenous land. This Fourth of July, let’s commit to returning it.”
Ben & Jerry’s added that the US should “start with Mount Rushmore,” writing, “The faces on Mount Rushmore are the faces of men who actively worked to destroy Indigenous cultures and ways of life.”
On Friday, Don Stevens — chief of the Nulhegan Band of The Coosuk Abenaki Nation, one among 4 tribes descended from the Abenaki which are recognized in Vermont — told The Post in an interview that he “looks forward to any type of correspondence with the brand to see how they will higher profit Indigenous people.”
Chief of the Nulhegan Band of The Coosuk Abenaki Nation, Don Stevens, noted that the corporate’s corporate headquarters can be positioned on “stolen Indigenous land.”Facebook/Ludlow Rotary Club of Vermont, USA
Stevens added that if the ice cream maker is “sincere,” it should reach out to him as the corporate’s corporate headquarters — positioned at 30 Community Dr. in South Burlington, Vt. — is situated on Western Abanaki land.
“Should you have a look at the [Abenaki] traditional way of being, we’re place-based people. Before recognized tribes within the state, we were those who were on this place,” Stevens said, adding that the Abenaki view themselves as “stewards of the land.”
“Humans have a responsibility to deal with resources in places because we’ve got the flexibility to destroy,” he added.
Representatives for Ben & Jerry’s didn’t immediately reply to The Post’s request for comment.
Ben & Jerry’s this week also included a call to motion with a link to sign a petition to return Mount Rushmore to the Lakota peoples.
Stevens declined to invest on how the Lakota might react to Ben & Jerry’s comments on Mount Rushmore.
“I even have not had a conversation with them [Ben & Jerry’s], so I cannot make a judgement,” he said.
Abanaki is an Algonquian-speaking confederacy of Native Americans that merged with other tribes within the seventeenth Century to guard themselves from other tribes, based on Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Historians estimated that within the early 1600s, about 10,000 Abenaki lived in what’s now Vermont.
There’s currently about 2,500 members left within the state.
Despite the controversy Ben & Jerry’s has landed itself in, Stevens said he’s enjoyed Ben & Jerry’s ice cream, though it didn’t appear to think it was anything special.
“I enjoy ice cream. I’ve tried theirs [Ben & Jerry’s] and I’ve tried many others,” he told The Post. “It’s a product like every other product.”
On July 4, Ben & Jerry’s shared a controversial message on its social media and website that’s left ice cream fans calling for a boycott.
Stevens said that the Vermont-based ice cream maker has yet to approach him about and speak about returning its plot to the Abenaki people.LightRocket via Getty Images
Ben & Jerry’s Fourth of July call received mixed responses, with many calling for boycotts of the brand in a move that echoes the aftermath of Bud Light’s recent partnership with trans model Dylan Mulvaney.
Ben & Jerry’s corporate parent, Unilever, got a taste of the backlash as $2 billion was erased from its market cap within the wake of the July 4 post.
Shares of Unilever, the Anglo-Dutch multinational firm, slid 0.8% Thursday after closing down 0.5% the day gone by.
On Friday — three days after Ben & Jerry’s shared its unpatriotic tweet — Unilever’s share price slid one other 0.5%.
