Breitbart News reports that Florida is divesting all public funds from Ben & Jerry’s over the ice cream giant’s “anti-Semitic” decision to stop sales in Israeli settlements in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem.
The move comes three months after Governor Ron DeSantis ordered the State Board of Administration to add Ben & Jerry’s parent company Unilever to its list of “scrutinized companies” that boycott Israel. During that time, no decisions were taken by the ice cream giant to reverse the decision.
Ben & Jerry‘s in August announced it would no longer sell ice cream in what it called the “Occupied Palestinian Territory,” meaning the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem.
Last month, Arizona became the first state to divest all public funds– amounting to more than $140 million – from Ben & Jerry‘s and its parent company Unilever over what it deemed was an “anti-Semitic” move. New Jersey has followed suit, divesting $180 million in Unilever stock. Texas has also added Ben & Jerry’s and Unilever to a list of companies that boycott Israel.
There are eight states currently investigating whether state-level anti-BDS laws are applicable to the Ben & Jerry‘s Israel boycott.
Earlier this month, Ben Cohen and co-founder Jerry Greenfield were asked by an interviewer why the decision to boycott a state over its policies never stretched to Georgia and Texas, despite their vocal opposition to those states’ abortion and voting rights laws.
Stumped, Cohen shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said, laughing. “You ask a really good question and I think I’d have to sit down and think about it for a bit.”