Red Hen restaurant controversy

The Red Hen is a "tiny farm-to-table restaurant" with 26 seats almost 200 miles (320 km) from Washington, D.C., in Lexington, Virginia.[1] At about 8:00 pm on Friday, June 22, 2018, The Red Hen's chef telephoned the restaurant's co-owner Stephanie Wilkinson to report that Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary had entered the restaurant to dine with a group of about eight people.[1] Wilkinson told The Washington Post that, after conferring with her employees, she told Sanders that the restaurant upholds standards "such as honesty, and compassion, and cooperation" and asked Sanders to leave, which Sanders did.[1] Wilkinson related that the other people at Sanders' table had been served appetizers and were invited to stay, but they also left, Wilkinson saying their appetizers were on the house.[1] In the morning press briefing of Monday, June 25, Sanders said that she and her husband went home.[2]

The incident ignited a political debate about civility, invoking comparisons to similar incidents.[11] Commentators referenced the 2012 Masterpiece Cakeshop incident in which a Colorado baker refused to make a custom wedding cake for a gay couple,[14] the 2012 Crumb and Get It bakery incident in which a Virginia baker declined to host a campaign media event for then-Vice President Joe Biden,[11] and the 2015 refusal by county clerk Kim Davis to issue a marriage license to a same-sex couple in Kentucky.[15]

A later incident similar to the Red Hen controversy occurred when the Metzger Bar and Butchery of Richmond, Virginia, on November 30, 2022, "canceled a private event reserved by The Family Foundation, a faith-based nonprofit that has aggressively lobbied against the Respect for Marriage Act."[16]

The restaurant's Yelp page was quickly flooded with mostly one- and five-star reviews created by opponents and supporters of Wilkinson's action.[17] As of June 25, Yelp was actively monitoring the listing and deleting postings that were perceived as being motivated "by the news coverage itself [rather] than [by] the reviewer's personal consumer experience with the business."[18]

Fortune magazine reported that, as a result of a tweet by Donald Trump, an unaffiliated District of Columbia restaurant with the same name was targeted by conservatives with negative Yelp reviews and denunciations on Twitter.[19][20] Other unaffiliated restaurants with the same name in Swedesboro, New Jersey and Old Saybrook, Connecticut, as well as against the Olde Red Hen in Ontario and the Little Red Hen in Muntinlupa, the Philippines, were similarly targeted with negative reviews and criticism on Twitter.[21]

Supporters and opponents demonstrated outside the restaurant on June 26, resulting in one arrest and the closure of the street in front of the business for two hours.[22] The restaurant remained closed for almost two weeks after the incident, experiencing a protest on its July 9 re-opening[11] but receiving an increase in business in succeeding days.[23]

By June 27, the URL of the restaurant's website had been redirected to a site selling erectile dysfunction medication,[24] a Malwarebytes security specialist indicating that the redirect was likely from scammers seeking to "capitalize on heightened internet traffic to the website because of the headlines" rather than for political purposes.[25]

It was reported on June 26 that Sanders was to receive temporary Secret Service protection at her home,[26] protection that Sanders confirmed on about August 2.[4]

On September 2, The Roanoke Times reported that the Rockbridge Regional Tourism Board had agreed to spend $5,000 monthly from July through September to increase positive digital marketing in response to negative national media coverage after the incident.[27] The money was taken from an emergency fund comprising about 20% ($160,000) of its $800,000 overall annual budget.[27]

In May 2019, co-owner Stephanie Wilkinson wrote in the Washington Post that the restaurant had been receiving hate mail for nearly a year, but "[f]or every hateful message, there was one of gratitude." She reported that "business is still good," and "to everyone who might be fearful about taking a stand, I say don't be. Resistance is not futile, for you or your business."[28]

On Saturday, June 23, Walter Shaub, past director of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics under Presidents Obama and Trump (through July 2017), wrote that Sanders' June 23 tweet violated federal law[29] pertaining to Standards of Ethical Conduct and Misuse of Position.[30] Shaub wrote that Sanders used her official government Twitter account, having three million followers, "to condemn a private business for personal reasons. Seeks to coerce business by using her office to get public to pressure it. Violates endorsements ban too, which has an obvious corollary for discouraging patronage."[30] In the press briefing of Monday, June 25, Sanders said that over a dozen reporters had contacted her and that multiple news stories had already been issued, so she considered it to be "news of the day" to which she responded on her official government Twitter account.[2]

Some commentators perceived a parallel between the Red Hen incident and the facts underlying the Supreme Court's June 4, 2018, Masterpiece Cakeshop decision, ruling in favor of a Colorado baker who refused to make a custom wedding cake for a gay couple based on the baker's religious opposition to their marriage.[14] However, in contrast to the Federal Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars discrimination based on race, religion, national origin, and color, Virginia state law does not provide that political affiliation is a protected trait against discrimination.[14]

• Official Red Hen website
• Sanders' June 23, 2018 tweet about the incident
• Trump's June 25, 2018 tweet about the incident Archived July 4, 2018, at the Wayback Machine
• First, second, and third tweets from Walter Shaub reasserted illegality of Sanders' June 23, 2018, tweet
• "Did a Business Owner Picket Sarah Huckabee Sanders' Family After They Left Her Restaurant? Mike Huckabee claimed in interviews that the owner of the Red Hen in Lexington, Virginia, organized an impromptu protest against his daughter's family". Snopes. June 28, 2018. Archived from the original on March 26, 2022. Rating: Mostly False.