After forty years of funding grassroots social justice organizations, the Ben & Jerry’s Foundation announced Wednesday it will shut down at the end of 2026 unless it wins a favorable court ruling in an ongoing legal dispute with its parent company, The Magnum Ice Cream Company.
The foundation’s decision to suspend operations marks the latest and most dramatic escalation in a years-long battle between Ben & Jerry’s co-founders and the corporate entities that now control the Vermont-based ice cream brand. The closure will eliminate roughly $600,000 in annual grants to Vermont organizations focused on immigrant rights, LGBTQ+ issues, and other social causes.
The foundation said it has no choice but to shut down after Magnum cut its funding in April 2025 and ordered it to vacate its South Burlington corporate office by Wednesday. Three foundation staff members lost their positions as a result of the eviction. The foundation’s directors say they cannot operate without these resources and have filed a lawsuit seeking to restore funding and reverse the office closure.
“After forty years of investing in grassroots organizations working to make the world a more just and better place, TMICC is causing us to shut down at exactly the moment that work is most urgently needed,” said Liz Bankowski, president of the foundation’s board of trustees, using the abbreviation for The Magnum Ice Cream Company. “While we’ve lost funding and been removed from our office, we stand firm in the belief that the law and the facts are on our side.”
The dispute centers on a governance structure that has protected Ben & Jerry’s social mission since Unilever acquired the company for $326 million in 2000. The acquisition agreement established an independent board to oversee the brand’s social mission and committed to funding the foundation under an annual formula. For more than two decades, the foundation operated without corporate interference.
That changed when Unilever spun off its ice cream division into Magnum in December 2025. Within months, Magnum cut the foundation’s funding and initiated what foundation leaders describe as an assault on the brand’s independence. Magnum has also removed members of Ben & Jerry’s independent board, reducing it to just two directors—the CEO and a Unilever-appointed representative.
Magnum disputes the foundation’s characterization of events. The company says an independent audit in April 2025 found conflicts of interest and deficiencies in financial controls and governance at the foundation. Magnum contends the foundation trustees refused to implement stronger governance practices and instead chose litigation.
“The decision to suspend operations is entirely down to the Trustees and their decision to ignore the findings of an independent audit and failure to put in place basic good governance,” Magnum said in a statement. The company added that it remains “firmly committed to funding a grant-giving foundation” with proper oversight.
However, the foundation disputes Magnum’s account. Foundation leaders say they were never given access to the full audit report and that previous audits over five years identified no similar governance concerns. They characterize the audit as a pretext for cutting funding and undermining their independence.
The legal fight reflects broader tensions that have consumed Ben & Jerry’s since the Magnum spin-off. Ben Cohen, the company’s co-founder, has become the public face of resistance to corporate control, launching a “Free Ben & Jerry’s” campaign calling on Magnum to sell the brand to more socially aligned investors. His co-founder Jerry Greenfield resigned in September 2025 after 47 years, saying the company had been “silenced, sidelined for fear of upsetting those in power” by corporate ownership.
The disputes have centered on Ben & Jerry’s commitment to social activism. The brand is known for taking public stances on controversial political and social issues, from Palestinian rights to climate change to racial justice. Ben & Jerry’s argues that this activism is core to its mission and protected under the original merger agreement. Magnum, which is now a publicly traded company, has resisted these campaigns, leading to accusations of censorship.
The independent board and the foundation have sued in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeking to compel Magnum to honor its obligations under the original acquisition agreement and cease interfering with Ben & Jerry’s social mission. The foundation won the right to join this lawsuit in March 2026 after Magnum cut its funding. The case is expected to extend into next year.
Rebecca Golden, the foundation’s director of programs who has worked there for 34 years, described the potential shutdown as “an enormous loss” affecting not only the organizations the foundation supports but also Ben & Jerry’s employees proud of their connection to the philanthropic work.
Since Ben & Jerry’s sold to Unilever in 2000, the corporation has given $60 million to the foundation. The foundation does not have an endowment and depends entirely on annual funding from its parent company. The foundation supports organizations working on immigrant rights, voting rights, environmental protection, and other progressive causes.
Ben Cohen said he remains confident that the law and facts support the foundation’s position. He has called on the public to visit freebenandjerrys.com to support efforts to restore the foundation and return the company to independent ownership. In April, Cohen and Greenfield delivered over 100,000 petition signatures to Magnum’s Amsterdam headquarters demanding the company be sold.
The foundation’s fate now rests with the federal court. Foundation leaders say they are fully committed to pursuing their legal challenge and expect resolution to extend into 2027. The outcome will determine whether Ben & Jerry’s foundation can continue its forty-year legacy of funding grassroots social change or whether the shutdown proceeds as planned at year’s end.