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White House press secretary Sarah Sanders was kicked out of a restaurant because she works for Donald Trump. Critics immediately are crying "discrimination." And, "Liberal discrimination."
However, bear in mind: Trump Press Secretary Sanders was not asked to leave on grounds of any actionable civil rights tort.
Signs saying "We reserve the right not to serve people" for various reasons, as little as "don't be wearing a hoodie" have been commonplace in businesses, including-- uh, especially restaurants-- for my whole 69 years and way before that. I do not believe that such a statement needs to be posted in the restaurant for the owner to be within her rights to make the decision to ask any given party to leave.
Hypothetical question: is there anyone out there who, if (s)he owned a restaurant, would happily serve a party dressed in brown-shirt Nazi garb, including swastikas? How about Kay Kay Kay in robes (but with hoods off to eat of course)? The Constitutional questions start with the First Amendment, and "I'd like you to leave" is way within the owner's rights as long as she can not be proven to have violated the party ejected's civil rights by doing so.
And yes, the cake case IS different, there is a civil rights issue involved, discrimination because of sexual preference. One commenter, posting as @I love you too, suggested that the two plaintiffs were looking for a legal battle when they went and asked this particular baker to decorate their wedding cake in a particular gay-themed way.
He may be right. I do (and I am a minor owner in the restaurant business) see the baker's side, no matter that I disagree with the USSC's decision.
Personally, if I had a husband-to-be (I can always hope for the possibility), and went some place where the customer was not always right, I would have found me another baker. Maybe even a gay one, who would have been enthusiastic about the job. We can all get along :)
And one takes one's chances when going to court.
I don't know whether this popular reaction against Trump figures (Kirstjen Nielsen and Stephen Miller, not to mention conservative provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos, have also faced spontaneous restaurant-crowd objections when going out to eat) will result in the polarization of restaurant clienteles (or more "86s"). If it does, though, I have a feeling that the restaurants who stand up for serving Trumpists are going to get rather the worse of it.
Working for Donald Trump is becoming a social liability not just for high-ranking staffers who go out to dinner, but among more junior people who work for him. I read a couple of other stories in the last few days
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which said that the love life of young Trump staffers was suffering because of their affiliation with the presidency, to the point that some were now only dating within the administration.
I say, good for the owner of the Red Hen, Stephanie Wilkinson. She's a proper American.
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