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For Immediate Release
August, 21 2008, 04:00pm EDT
Contact:
Daniel Kessler, Greenpeace media officer
970.690.2728
Wall*E + Kleenex = Iron*E
What:
Celebrated animator Mark Fiore and Greenpeace have teamed up to create
a short animation to parody the release of Kleenex boxes featuring the
popular character Wall*E. The piece highlights the biting irony of the
world's largest maker of disposable tissues, Kimberly-Clark, using a
children's movie with a strong environmental message to sell a product
made of "virgin" fiber clearcut from ancient forests and containing no
recycled content.
UNITED STATES
What:
Celebrated animator Mark Fiore and Greenpeace have teamed up to create
a short animation to parody the release of Kleenex boxes featuring the
popular character Wall*E. The piece highlights the biting irony of the
world's largest maker of disposable tissues, Kimberly-Clark, using a
children's movie with a strong environmental message to sell a product
made of "virgin" fiber clearcut from ancient forests and containing no
recycled content. In this new spoof, our hero Wall*E is wandering a
devastated future world when he stumbles upon one of his robot
predecessors: a demonic machine named Kleer*E bent on clearcutting
forests to create Kleenex brand tissues. In song and dance, Kleer*E
reveals why Wall*E lives in a world without forests, wildlife or people.
When: Released today: Thursday, August 21, 2008
Where:
www.greenpeace.org/wall-e. There, online activists can also tell
Kimberly-Clark executives that they need to improve their environmental
practices by using recycled material and staying out of Endangered
Forest regions.
Why:
There's a secret that Kimberly-Clark does not want you to know: Every
Kleenex tissue is made from ancient forests. In fact, the tissues
contain no recycled fiber at all. None. Instead, Kleenex is made from
trees up to 180 years old cut from ancient forests that are up to
10,000 years old. These forests are home to eagles, bears, foxes and
endangered caribou that are losing more habitat with every box of
Kleenex bought. Despite
mounting pressure Kleenex's parent company, the Kimberly-Clark
Corporation, has been unwilling to improve its practices, continuing to
rely on paper and pulp made from clearcut Endangered forest, including
North America's Boreal Forest. Kimberly-Clark clears these ancient
forests, essential in fighting climate change and providing home to
wildlife like caribou, wolves, eagles and bears, to make products that
are flushed down the toilet or thrown away. Greenpeace has directly
communicated with Kimberly-Clark employees at various company outlets
asking them to take action, worked to get Kimberly-Clark products
removed from 12 universities, and issued a report last year, Cut &
Run, which details Kimberly-Clark's continued devastation of the
Kenogami Forest. Greenpeace demands that Kimberly-Clark:
- Stop purchasing virgin fiber from endangered forests including the North American Boreal forest
- Drastically
increase the amount of recycled fiber, in all products, including
Kleenex brand toilet paper, facial tissue and napkins - Only buy
virgin fiber from Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) eco-certified
forests. The FSC is the only guarantee that forests are managed
sustainably.
Greenpeace is a global, independent campaigning organization that uses peaceful protest and creative communication to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green and peaceful future.
+31 20 718 2000LATEST NEWS
Democracy Watchdog Exposes 'Heartbreaking Catalog of DOGE's Depredations'
"Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s attacks on the federal government will have long-standing effects on the American public," said the group's research director.
Jan 20, 2026
Exactly a year after President Donald Trump returned to office and swiftly signed an executive order establishing the Department of Government Efficiency, the Revolving Door Project on Tuesday released a report detailing all the damage that DOGE has done.
"Under the banner of the so-called 'Department of Government Efficiency' (DOGE), Elon Musk and Russell Vought have eagerly shred political, professional, and legal precedent in their effort to dismantle the essential functions of the federal government—and most importantly, democracy at large," says the report, DOGE: From Meme to Government Erosion Machine.
In addition to being the richest person on Earth, Musk was DOGE's de facto leader until he left the administration at the end of May, on bad terms with Trump—a falling out addressed in the report. Meanwhile, Project 2025 architect Vought remains both director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).
CFPB is among the 20 "agencies targeted by DOGE" that have their own sections in the report. Each section features a timeline of attacks, outlines impacts on capacity and material harms, and lists notable names of ousted leadership and DOGE agents.
"We hope that this report will show the public how dangerous a madman Elon Musk is, and why corrupt billionaires, with zero experience in governance, have no place making decisions for career officials."
"After Musk's exit, DOGE, filled with his lackeys, remained a feature in the federal government," the report states. "In fact, the guiding principles of DOGE—traumatizing federal workers, decimating government capacity, and slashing funding for people and places in need—were rejuvenated, albeit with a new, more effective and more discreet standard bearer."
Vought, the publication explains, "began firming up DOGE's legacy behind the scenes, using the power of his office to embed DOGE personnel in federal agencies as full time staff and institutionalize funding cuts through illegal use of the Impoundment Control Act."
Elon Musk may have left government, but DOGE's guiding principles still remain under the guidance of OMB Director Russel Vought. If anything, Vought will carry out the decimation of government capacity with an efficiency and ideological ruthlessness that Musk never possessed.
[image or embed]
— Revolving Door Project (@revolvingdoordc.bsky.social) January 20, 2026 at 11:23 AM
As OMB director, "Vought can review and reshape federal budget proposals according to his own ideological priorities, even if the agency leaders disagree," the document notes. "A supposed hyper-originalist and self-described Christian nationalist, Vought has used this leverage to reshape the federal government from the top down."
"The CFPB was a prime example of Vought’s vision of dismantling federal agencies that do not serve his interest," the report highlights, pointing to attack on personnel, agency funding, abandonment of key cases, and related legal battles. "The CFPB saga serves as a template of things to come with Vought at the helm of the DOGE mission."
Other targeted federal agencies include the Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Aviation Administration, Federal Bureau of Investigation, General Services Administration, Internal Revenue Service, Office of Personnel Management, United States Agency for International Development, US Institute of Peace, and US Postal Service.
As the report lays out, DOGE has also gone after the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Labor, the Treasury, and Veterans Affairs.
Our report breaks down DOGE’s activity at individual agencies in narrative order with timelines of the incursions, DOGE’s impact on workforce capacity, the material harms that DOGE’s cuts generated, and the names of ousted agency leadership.
[image or embed]
— Revolving Door Project (@revolvingdoordc.bsky.social) January 20, 2026 at 11:23 AM
"DOGE agents—a cohort of unelected, unqualified, and unaccountable goons recruited from Elon Musk and Peter Thiel's orbit—have been given unfettered access to the internal machinery of federal agencies," the report says, naming another Big Tech billionaire. "From seizing control of the nation's payment system at the Treasury Department to orchestrating mass purges of the experts who ensure our food is safe, these actors bypassed traditional oversight to strip agencies of their ability to serve the American public."
Revolving Door Project deputy research director Christopher Lewis warned in a Tuesday statement that "Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s attacks on the federal government will have long-standing effects on the American public. From the cuts to the National Weather Service to the axing of fraud agents at the Federal Student Aid Office, every single American has and will continue to feel the effects of this administration's illegal and corrupt actions."
"We hope that this report will show the public how dangerous a madman Elon Musk is, and why corrupt billionaires, with zero experience in governance, have no place making decisions for career officials," he continued. "Our feckless Congress, especially Trump's enablers on the Hill, should be ashamed of themselves and what they have wrought."
"Our feckless Congress, especially Trump's enablers on the Hill, should be ashamed of themselves and what they have wrought."
Various recent analyses have exposed how US billionaires have benefited from Trump's second term and the Republican-controlled Congress while working-class Americans face an intensifying affordability crisis, struggling to afford everything from rent and groceries to soaring health insurance premiums.
"If anyone needed evidence that getting rich doesn't require brains or judgment, or that the private sector's supposed superiority over public servants was a myth, this heartbreaking catalog of DOGE's depredations should more than suffice," said Revolving Door Project executive director Jeff Hauser.
"The main lesson to be learned from Musk and DOGE," he added, "is that the next administration should pay careful attention to what DOGE did and proceed to do the exact opposite."
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"What happens today to UNRWA will happen tomorrow to any other international organization or diplomatic mission, whether in the occupied Palestinian territory or anywhere around the world," said the agency.
Jan 20, 2026
Israeli authorities' demolition of the headquarters of the United Nations agency that has for decades provided aid and civil services to Palestinians in territories illegally occupied by Israel was about "more than destroying walls," said one journalist and rights advocate in the region.
The bulldozing of the complex on Monday attacks the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East's (UNRWA) "very mission since 1949, violates the rights of Palestinian refugees, and aims to erase the support system they rely on," said Maha Hussaini, head of media and public engagement at the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor.
Hussaini was among those who spoke out as Israeli forces stormed the complex with bulldozers and began destroying buildings at the site after having sealed off the surrounding streets in East Jerusalem, the occupied city that Palestinians consider the capital of a future Palestinian state.
The Israel Defense Forces and demolition workers were also accompanied by Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who said the destruction of the compound, which has operated at the site for decades, marked a "historic day."
UN officials and other rights advocates, such as Jonathan Whittall—formerly the head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Human Affairs in the occupied Palestinian territories—said Israeli authorities were once again broadcasting their "contravention of their obligations under international law."
This morning, Israeli authorities are demolishing #UnitedNations property in #EastJerusalem, yet another live-streamed contravention of their obligations under international law. Just months ago, the ICJ reaffirmed that Israel "may not obstruct the functions of UNRWA in the OPT". pic.twitter.com/wqXvKzcKkH
— Jonathan Whittall (@_jwhittall) January 20, 2026
Whittall emphasized that Israel's destruction of UN property came months after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) "reaffirmed that Israel 'may not obstruct the functions of UNRWA.'"
UNRWA released a statement accusing Israel of "a new level of open and deliberate defiance of international law," noting that the country is obligated "to protect and respect the inviolability of UN premises."
Ben-Gvir led the destruction of the headquarters more than a year after Israeli lawmakers passed a law banning UNRWA, and weeks after the country banned dozens of international aid groups from operating in Gaza. Israeli officials claimed in 2024 that a small fraction of UNRWA's 13,000 staffers in Gaza had been involved in a Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, but an independent investigation found that they had not backed up their claims with evidence.
UNRWA noted that last week, Israeli forces stormed an UNRWA health center in East Jerusalem and ordered it closed, and water and power supplies to the agency's health and education buildings across the region are scheduled to be cut in the coming weeks.
"These actions, together with previous arson attacks and a large-scale disinformation campaign, fly in the face of the ruling in October by the International Court of Justice, which restated that Israel is obliged under international law to facilitate UNRWA’s operations, not hinder or prevent them," said UNRWA. "The court also stressed that Israel has no jurisdiction over East Jerusalem."
"There can be no exceptions. This must be a wake-up call," the agency added. "What happens today to UNRWA will happen tomorrow to any other international organization or diplomatic mission, whether in the occupied Palestinian territory or anywhere around the world. International law has come under increasing attack for too long and is risking irrelevancy in the absence of response by member states.”
In the UK, member of Parliament Jeremy Corbyn spoke to his fellow lawmakers about the destruction of the UNRWA compound—on top of Israel's continued slaughter of Palestinians despite a "ceasefire" deal that was reached in October and settler attacks in the West Bank—and demanded to know: "When is the British government going to impose sanctions on Israel for its endless violations of international law?"
Israel has begun bulldozing the UNRWA headquarters in occupied Jerusalem.
When is the British government going to impose sanctions on Israel for its endless violations of international law? pic.twitter.com/YADND8varu
— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) January 20, 2026
International law advocate and UN representative Mohamad Safa noted that Israeli authorities violated Article 52 of Additional Protocol (I) Geneva Conventions and the UN Charter when they took over UNRWA's headquarters and raised the Israeli flag there.
"Another violation of international law being broadcast live. Israel's impunity must end!" he said.
Last week, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said the UN could take Israel before the ICJ over its laws targeting UNRWA.
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"Milquetoast calls for better identification, bodycams, and training fall far short of what is required of you to meet this moment."
Jan 20, 2026
A broad coalition of organizations is calling on the US Congress to block funding for the mass surveillance programs being used by federal immigration enforcement officials.
In a letter sent to members of Congress, the groups decry US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents for "leveraging a multi-billion dollar budget to terrorize our communities and build a surveillance panopticon" with no accountability from elected officials.
The letter then singles out several mass surveillance projects being carried out under the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that it says are worthy of defunding, including "building databases of biometrics, sensitive personal data, and daily movements of not only immigrants, but everybody in the US"; "purchasing technology to surveil all the phones in a neighborhood without a warrant"; and "recklessly relying on facial recognition technology that is banned in some states, and misusing that data to intimidate protesters and witnesses."
The groups call on Congress to completely defund ICE or, if that is not politically feasible, to "severely restrict what ICE can spend money on, including a complete moratorium on the purchase and use of surveillance tech" such as facial recognition and license plate readers.
"We urge you to do everything within your power in order to block ICE’s reign of terror in our communities and halt the build out of surveillance tech infrastructure that will make it impossible for everyday people to do anything at all without Big Brother watching," the groups conclude. "Milquetoast calls for better identification, bodycams, and training fall far short of what is required of you to meet this moment."
Signatories of the letter include the Yale Privacy Lab, digital rights organization Fight for the Future, and several local chapters of progressive political organizing group Indivisible.
ICE's big investments in surveillance technology were documented in an Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) report published earlier this month, which found ICE "is going on a shopping spree, creating one of the largest, most comprehensive domestic surveillance machines in history."
The EFF report highlighted the role played by Cellebrite, a company that helps ICE unlock protesters' phones and "take a complete image of all the data on the phone, including apps, location history, photos, notes, call records, text messages, and even Signal and WhatsApp messages."
This is particularly important, the report noted, because the number of phones searched by ICE and other agencies has been steadily increasing, hitting a record high last year.
ICE also has a contract with Paragon, the company behind the spyware Graphite that "is able to harvest messages from multiple different encrypted chat apps such as Signal and WhatsApp without the user ever knowing."
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