Ben and Jerry, as in ice cream-maker co-founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, were arrested with about 300 others at the U.S. Capitol Monday during the so-called "Democracy Awakening" protests in Washington, D.C., reported
CNN.
Cohen and Greenfield, who founded Ben & Jerry's ice cream in 1978, took part in the protests that targeted voting rights, money in politics, and a hearing for President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee, reported CNN.
"The history of our country is that nothing happens until people start putting their bodies on the line and risk getting arrested," Cohen said on the
Ben & Jerry website.
On Tuesday, the ice cream makers, who are based in Vermont, were stumping for Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders in Wilmington, Delaware, according to the
News Journal. They created the ice cream flavor Bernie's Yearning in honor of Sanders, who has represented Vermont in the U.S. Senate since 2006.
"At a certain point, you have to say enough is enough," Greenfield said in a statement released to Democracy Awakening. "I have decided to risk arrest because we can't continue to have a political system where ordinary people are shut out of the process. It's not what our founders envisioned, and it’s not what democracy is supposed to be about."
U.S. Capitol Police said the arrests took place on the east front rotunda steps of the U.S. Capitol. Those arrested were charged with "crowding, obstructing, or incommoding." They were processed and released.
Among others arrested were Cornell Brooks, president of the NAACP; Tefere Gebre, executive vice president of the AFL-CIO; and Rev. William Barber, who founded the Moral Mondays movement in North Carolina.
"It all comes down to a simple idea that we believe in whole-heartedly: if you care about something, you have to be willing to risk it all — your reputation, your values, your business — for the greater good," a statement on Ben & Jerry's website said.
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