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Ben & Jerry's ice cream is feuding with a top GOP operative on Twitter
It's a rocky road to get to the White House.
A top spokesman for the national Republican Party attacked a 2016 candidate for offering supporters free ice cream on Tuesday.
The Ben & Jerry's ice cream brand eventually got involved in the spat on Twitter.
When Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) officially kicked off his Democratic campaign for president on Tuesday, treats from the Vermont-based ice cream company Ben & Jerry's were on hand. And, according to reporters present, the company distributed free ice cream and attendees formed a long line to get it:
The free Ben & Jerry's at Bernie Sanders' 2016 campaign kickoff is flowing. And melting. pic.twitter.com/FrriG7DAC6
— Dylan Stableford (@stableford) May 26, 2015
The line for free Ben & Jerry's at Bernie Sanders' campaign launch. pic.twitter.com/lNOrxTRiMy
— Dylan Stableford (@stableford) May 26, 2015
But Sean Spicer, the communications director for the Republican National Committee, argued on Twitter that Ben & Jerry's should report the ice cream as an "in-kind" contribution to the Sanders campaign:
so @BernieSanders rallies against corporations but has no problem taking @benandjerrys free handouts at kickoff
— Sean Spicer (@seanspicer) May 27, 2015
Ben & Jerry's, which was purchased by the conglomerate Unilever in 2001, responded to the broadside. Through an official account, the brand tweeted that the ice cream was donated by its founders, not the company itself:
@seanspicer Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield (citizens) donated the ice cream. We have similar values as the Senator, but are non-partisan.
— Ben & Jerry's (@benandjerrys) May 27, 2015
But Spicer maintained that the ice cream should still be reported as a contribution to the Sanders campaign:
.@benandjerrys great. There are still laws. One is you can't donate without reporting it to the Federal Election Commission
— Sean Spicer (@seanspicer) May 27, 2015
Reached for comment by Business Insider, Spicer said he didn't have anything to add on the topic beyond what he wrote on Twitter.
"Just want to know if it was properly reported," he wrote in an email.
The Sanders campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment asking if, in fact, the ice cream was reported to the Federal Election Commission. However, Ben & Jerry's co-founder Ben Cohen insisted the ice cream giveaway was conducted "exactly by the book."
"It was a donation from Jerry [Greenfield] and I personally and, you know, I talked to Bernie before the event and Bernie said he'd like to buy ice cream to have at the event," Cohen explained. "We were trying to figure out how to do that and Jerry pointed out that we needed to do this exactly by the book because there's probably going to be somebody who's going to try to make some kind of crack like this guy is making. So, we did this exactly by the book."
Cohen said he and Greenfield, who remain employed by the company though it was bought by Unilever, "paid the employee discount price" for the ice cream and it was an in-kind contribution to Sanders' campaign. Additionally, the pair also made cash donations.
"We've each made a donation to Bernie of $1,000 besides the ice cream," Cohen said. "We just wanted to make sure that everything we've done was legal.
This post was updated with Cohen's comments at 12:52 p.m.
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