Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise
A nonprofit research and public education organization
12500 N.E. Tenth Place/ Bellevue, WA 98005/ www.cdfe.org/ 425-455-5038/
Fax: 425-451-3959

ALERT TO ALL PAPER AND WOOD RETAILERS!

BEWARE THE RAINFOREST ACTION NETWORK!

THREATS AND FORCE TO COERCE CORPORATE AGREEMENT

Rainforest Action Network (RAN) scenario:

First you get a polite but firm letter from RAN saying, "there is no way around the fact that your firm will be a major focus in our rainforest protection campaign."

Then you get a mob of screaming RAN protesters hanging banners on your storefront, intimidating customers, harassing your employees, and trashing your inventory — for the TV cameras.

After reeling from the bad publicity, you get a call from RAN for an appointment with their president, Randall Hayes, who offers you "a peaceable solution." The solution is to obey his demands.

Finally you agree to cut off the suppliers RAN tells you to, hoping you've avoided more conflict, yet knowing that if we don't use the rainforest, there will be no products. You worry about both.

WHY IS THE RAINFOREST ACTION NETWORK SO RADICAL?

• Created in 1985 by radical Earth First! film maker Randall Hayes and Earth First! co-founder Mike Roselle, who has been arrested for trespass more than 25 times.

•  The RAN "network" includes Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and the Sierra Club.

• More than 90 of those present at the 1985 organizational kickoff meeting were with Earth First!, radicals associated with logging equipment destruction and felony tree-spiking.

• RAN was aided in fundraising by radical environmental icon David Brower, and got media attention with help from Herb Gunther and his left wing Public Media Center.

WHAT DOES THE RAINFOREST ACTION NETWORK DO?

• RAN uses the tactic of trespass protests as a media platform to accuse firms of destroying rainforests. Many RAN activists have been arrested on trespass and sabotage charges.

• RAN uses false accusations. Typical example: A RAN group occupying a log ship in Longview, WA in 1996 protested Mitsubishi's "forest practices." Mitsubishi didn't own the ship or any timberlands, but got logs from independent sellers, so had no "forest practices." A jury convicted the protesters of felony sabotage, a verdict later overturned on a technicality. RAN is also telling lies about Boise-Cascade, linking the company to a human rights tragedy in Mexico—a charge with absolutely no basis in fact.

• RAN links itself with anti-capitalist zealots — RAN was a major player in staging the 1999 WTO Seattle protest that turned into riots.

• RAN justifies its radical tactics as "reflecting public values" to avoid accountability. When penniless RAN protesters get arrested, the media do not mention the group's multi-million-dollar budget or ask why RAN President Randall Hayes doesn't go out to get arrested.

• RAN gets funding from some of America's biggest liberal foundations. RAN's early funding came from Pew Charitable Trusts, W. Alton Jones Foundation, and other giant liberal foundations. RAN's current $2.6 million annual budget comes from equally liberal sources such as the Turner Foundation, the Goldman Fund, and the radical Foundation for Deep Ecology. RAN's donors are funding unlawful activity. Why don't they pay damages?

WHAT DOESN'T THE RAINFOREST ACTION NETWORK DO?

• RAN can't enforce the peaceable solution it offers. You can get rid of suppliers RAN doesn't like, but RAN has no power to stop the NEXT green group's greater demands.

• RAN can't indemnify you from anti-trust charges. You don't know if RAN is funded by shareholders of predatory competitors, or if a RAN agreement amounts to restraint of trade.