The White House press secretary Sarah Sanders claimed on Saturday that she was thrown out of a restaurant because she works for Donald Trump.
How family separations caused Trump's first retreat – and deepened his bunker mentality Read more
Social media erupted, with some lavishing praise on the Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Virginia, for taking a moral stand. Others sympathetic to the president urged a customer boycott.
“Last night I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for POTUS and I politely left,” Sanders posted on Twitter. “Her actions say far more about her than about me.”
The press secretary added: “I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so.”
Her father, Mike Huckabee, a former governor of Arkansas, candidate for the Republican presidential nomination and strong Trump supporter, responded to her tweet by writing: “Bigotry. On the menu at Red Hen Restaurant in Lexington VA. Or you can ask for the “Hate Plate”. And appetizers are ‘small plates for small minds’.”
The Red Hen did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Saturday but Stephanie Wilkinson, the owner, told the Washington Post Sanders had already been served when she approached the press secretary and asked her to step outside.
The restaurant has certain standards I feel it has to uphold, such as honesty and compassion and cooperation Stephanie Wilkinson, Red Hen
“I was babbling a little, but I got my point across in a polite and direct fashion,” Wilkinson said. “I explained that the restaurant has certain standards that I feel it has to uphold, such as honesty and compassion and cooperation. I said, ‘I’d like to ask you to leave.’”
Sanders, Wilkinson said, replied: “That’s fine. I’ll go.” The press secretary walked out and others at her table followed. Wilkinson said: “They offered to pay. I said, ‘No. It’s on the house.’”
The restaurant owner expressed no regrets, telling the Post: “I would have done the same thing again. We just felt there are moments in time when people need to live their convictions. This appeared to be one.”
Members of the Trump administration are facing a fierce backlash over the policy that has seen more than 2,300 children separated from their parents at the southern border and tarnished America’s reputation around the world.
Sanders’ banishment comes after Stephen Miller, a senior White House adviser responsible for its “zero tolerance” immigration policy, and Kirstjen Nielsen, the cabinet member responsible for enforcing it, were reportedly heckled and hounded out of Mexican restaurants in Washington.
Sanders has been notably reluctant to answer questions on the issue. Monday’s White House press briefing was delayed by four hours so Nielsen could fly back from New Orleans to face reporters instead. There were no briefings over the next four days, which is highly unusual.
That did not spare Sanders the wrath of restaurant staff. Jaike Foley-Schultz, who claimed he was a waiter at the restaurant, wrote on Facebook: “I just served Sarah Huckabee Sanders for a total of two minutes before my owner kicked her out along with seven of her other family members.”
Brennan Gilmore, executive director of the progressive group Clean Virginia, tweeted a photo of a handwritten note apparently from the restaurant that includes: “86 — Sara Huckabee Sanders.” The number “86” is industry slang for “throw out”.
Families torn apart: the anatomy of Trump's immigration U-turn Read more
Supporters and opponents of the administration swung into action with reviews on the restaurant’s Facebook and Yelp pages. Some gave it one star, others awarded it five. Twitter users traded blows over whether the incident was comparable to the case of a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple, which went all the way to the supreme court.
Michael McNamara Sr posted on the Red Hen’s Facebook page: “Better not speak while you’re there because if the staff disagrees with you they will toss you out. Why bother with the hassle? Plenty of real restaurants who serve everyone.”
Sapphire Cianfriglia wrote: “I appreciate how you decided to take a moral standing against an administration that is essentially emulating Nazi Germany (locking up children, letting white supremacists march freely in the streets, etc).”
The Trump administration is not the first to get an icy reception on the Washington foodie scene. Former defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld once took his family to Buck’s Fishing & Camping, only for co-owner and chef Carole Greenwood to declare that she would not serve “a war criminal”.
Sanders has been reported to be planning to leave the White House, although she denied that was so.
LEXINGTON, Va. — Stephanie Wilkinson was at home Friday evening — nearly 200 miles from the White House — when the choice presented itself.
Her phone rang about 8 p.m. It was the chef at the Red Hen, the tiny farm-to-table restaurant that she co-owned just off Main Street in this small city in the western part of the state.
Sarah Huckabee Sanders had just walked in and sat down, the chef informed her.
“He said the staff is a little concerned. What should we do?” Wilkinson told The Washington Post. “I said I’d be down to see if it’s true.”
It seemed unlikely to her that President Trump’s press secretary should be dining at a 26-seat restaurant in rural Virginia. But then, it was unlikely that her entire staff would have misidentified Sanders, who had arrived last to a table of eight booked under her husband’s name.
[Mike Huckabee tweets photo comparing Nancy Pelosi’s campaign staff to MS-13 gang members]
As she made the short drive to the Red Hen, Wilkinson knew only this:
She knew Lexington, population 7,000, had voted overwhelmingly against Trump in a county that voted overwhelmingly for him. She knew the community was deeply divided over such issues as Confederate flags. She knew, she said, that her restaurant and its half-dozen servers and cooks had managed to stay in business for 10 years by keeping politics off the menu.
And she knew — she believed — that Sarah Huckabee Sanders worked in the service of an “inhumane and unethical” administration. That she publicly defended the president’s cruelest policies, and that that could not stand.
“I’m not a huge fan of confrontation,” Wilkinson said. “I have a business, and I want the business to thrive. This feels like the moment in our democracy when people have to make uncomfortable actions and decisions to uphold their morals.”
Sarah Huckabee Sanders arrives at a media briefing at the White House. (Getty Images)
When she walked into the restaurant, Wilkinson saw that there had been no mistake. The Red Hen is no bigger than some apartments, and the group table was impossible to miss: Sanders in a black dress, her husband, three or four men and women of roughly similar ages, and an older couple.
“They had cheese boards in front of them,” Wilkinson said. Like any other family. The kitchen was already preparing the party’s main course. Wilkinson interrupted to huddle with her workers.
Several Red Hen employees are gay, she said. They knew Sanders had defended Trump’s desire to bar transgender people from the military. This month, they had all watched her evade questions and defend a Trump policy that caused migrant children to be separated from their parents.
“Tell me what you want me to do. I can ask her to leave,” Wilkinson told her staff, she said. “They said ‘yes.’ ”
It was important to Wilkinson, she said, that Sanders had already been served — that her staff had not simply refused her on sight. And it was important to her that Sanders was a public official, not just a customer with whom she disagreed, many of whom were included in her regular clientele.
All the same, she was tense as she walked up to the press secretary’s chair.
“I said, ‘I’m the owner,’ ” she recalled, ” ‘I’d like you to come out to the patio with me for a word.’ ”
They stepped outside, into another small enclosure, but at least out of the crowded restaurant.
“I was babbling a little, but I got my point across in a polite and direct fashion,” Wilkinson said. “I explained that the restaurant has certain standards that I feel it has to uphold, such as honesty, and compassion, and cooperation.
“I said, ‘I’d like to ask you to leave.’ ”
Last night I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left. Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so — Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) June 23, 2018
Wilkinson didn’t know how Sanders would react, or whether Trump’s chief spokeswoman had been called out in a restaurant before — as the president’s homeland security secretary had been days earlier.
Sanders’s response was immediate, Wilkinson said: ” ‘ That’s fine. I’ll go.’ ”
[‘I wanted to stop her crying’: The image of a migrant child that broke a photographer’s heart]
Sanders went back to the table, picked up her things and walked out. The others at her table had been welcome to stay, Wilkinson said. But they didn’t, so the servers cleared away the cheese plates and glasses.
“They offered to pay,” Wilkinson said. “I said, ‘No. It’s on the house.’ ”
At the end of the shift, Wilkinson said, staff members left the usual overnight note in the kitchen for the morning manager: a problem with the credit card machine. Restock vodka and tequila.
If you’ve ever heard the term “to 86 someone,” it comes from the restaurant industry — code to refuse service, or alternatively to take an item off the menu.
“86 – Sara Huckabee Sanders,” read the note, below the reminder to buy more Pellegrino.
.@PressSec got kicked out of the Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Va tonight. Apparently the owner didn’t want to serve her and her party out of moral conviction. pic.twitter.com/jr3bfiY3XY — Brennan Gilmore (@brennanmgilmore) June 23, 2018
One of the servers photographed the whiteboard before going home Friday. He had posted it to his public Facebook wall by the time Wilkinson woke up Saturday. For all the angst that evening, Wilkinson said, everything had taken place with decorum. She had been polite; Sanders had been polite; the press secretary’s family had been polite as they followed her out the door.
Not so much the rest of the world, as it discovered Red Hen waiter Jaike Foley-Schultz’s Facebook post: “I just served Sarah huckabee sanders for a total of 2 minutes before my owner asked her to leave.”
A fountain of alternately celebratory and outraged comments gushed from Foley-Schultz’s Facebook wall into the Red Hen’s social media accounts, then its Yelp review page.
[The chaotic effort to reunite immigrant parents with their separated kids]
Five stars: “Thank you for refusing to serve a person who lies to the American people for a living.”
One star: “They made some snide remark about a ‘spit souffle’ for the Florida nazi.’ ”
Between the fury and fawning of 2,000 people who almost certainly had not eaten at the restaurant, the Red Hen’s Yelp reviews almost instantly averaged out to two-and-a-half stars. Another Red Hen in the District was at pains to make clear that it had no affiliation with Wilkinson’s place.
And that was before Sanders confirmed the story in a Saturday-morning tweet, including the restaurant’s name and location.
“I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so,” the press secretary wrote. “Her actions say far more about her than about me.”
Wilkinson had no regrets about her decision.
“I would have done the same thing again,” she said “We just felt there are moments in time when people need to live their convictions. This appeared to be one.”
As she headed out the door to a weekend Main Street festival she had helped organize, she sounded hopeful that the Red Hen could open for business as usual Saturday night. Yes, she had seen calls for #MAGA protests on Facebook. “But this is a small enough town, and we’re known,” she said optimistically. “This is not going to be a giant surprise to anyone.”
The day brought surprises of its own.
A placard quoting the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. — “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend” — sits in the window of the Red Hen, which opened in Lexington in 2008. (The Washington Post)
By Saturday afternoon, reporters and photographers loitered outside the restaurant, as did people who had wandered over to gawk.
“Boo, Red Hen!” and “Yay, Trump!” were shouted, alternately, from the windows of passing cars. A Lexington resident had brought by a bouquet of flowers and a hand-lettered sign that read, “Democracy requires principled gov’t. Thank you Red Hen!!”
Meanwhile, Stephen Russek of Natural Bridge, Va., told a reporter: “I’m not crazy about everything Donald Trump does, but what they did to that woman in this restaurant is disgraceful.”
Chris Roessler, would-be customer, stood outside in confusion. He and his wife had booked an evening reservation, and just received an email canceling it.
“We would like to avoid exposing our patrons to any potential unpleasantness from outside entities,” Red Hen management had written — around the same time that fans of President Trump were doing their best to troll the restaurant’s phone line with fake reservations.
Unaware of the Sanders incident, Roessler said, he had walked to the restaurant to ask for answers, but no one would open the door.
The article has been updated multiple times.
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Last night, Press Secretary Sarah Sanders was kicked out of the Red Hen. No, not that Red Hen.
“I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left. Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so,” she tweeted.
Even though Sanders specifically mentioned that the restaurant is in Lexington, Virginia, that hasn’t stopped people from confusing it with a popular restaurant of the same name in DC’s Bloomingdale neighborhood. The two establishments are completely unaffiliated.
Mike Friedman, the chef and co-owner of DC’s Red Hen, says he noticed something was up when he started getting bombarded with social media notifications this morning. He hasn’t personally been to the restaurant today to see what kind of calls they’re getting, but the restaurant’s Yelp page is already being mistakenly bombarded with negative reviews.
“As far as I know, I haven’t gotten any major threats yet,” Friedman says. “I think that will change.”
The DC Red Hen sent out an email to media trying to clarify that it has nothing to do with the Red Hen in Lexington. But even on Washingtonian‘s website, traffic for reviews of DC’s Red Hen is spiking.
This is not the first time people have confused the restaurants. Friedman says they occasionally get reservation mix-ups with the other Red Hen.
Even though they share nothing but a name, would DC’s Red Hen have also kicked out Sanders?
“We serve everybody,” Friedman says. “Everybody is a guest. We treat everybody with the same respect.”
Jessica Sidman Food Editor Jessica Sidman covers the people and trends behind D.C.’s food and drink scene. Before joining Washingtonian in July 2016, she was Food Editor and Young & Hungry columnist at Washington City Paper. She is a Colorado native and University of Pennsylvania grad.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders was told to leave a Lexington, Virginia, restaurant Friday night, she said on Twitter Saturday morning. Sanders said the owner of the Red Hen in the Shenandoah Valley asked her to leave because she works for President Trump.
"Last night I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left. Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so," Sanders tweeted Saturday morning.
Last night I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left. Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so — Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) June 23, 2018
The Red Hen, located roughly 200 miles outside Washington, D.C., is a farm-to-table, American fare restaurant. CBS News has reached out to the restaurant. The restaurant's owner, Stephanie Wilkinson, explained to The Washington Post why she turned Sanders and her family out of the restaurant.
"I'm not a huge fan of confrontation," Wilkinson told the Post. "I have a business, and I want the business to thrive. This feels like the moment in our democracy when people have to make uncomfortable actions and decisions to uphold their morals."
Wilkinson had no regrets about her decision.
"I would have done the same thing again," she said "We just felt there are moments in time when people need to live their convictions. This appeared to be one."
Someone who claimed to be Sanders' server seemed to have posted earlier on social media about the incident. That post was tweeted out by Brennan Gilmore, the executive director of environmental group Clean Virginia.
.@PressSec got kicked out of the Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Va tonight. Apparently the owner didn’t want to serve her and her party out of moral conviction. pic.twitter.com/jr3bfiY3XY — Brennan Gilmore (@brennanmgilmore) June 23, 2018
Lexington is a small Virginia town that's home to the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) and Washington and Lee University.
Sanders' father, former Fox News host and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, accused the Red Hen of bigotry for kicking his daughter out of the restaurant. "Bigotry. On the menu at Red Hen Restaurant in Lexington VA," he tweeted. "Or you can ask for the 'Hate Plate'. And appetizers are 'small plates for small minds'."
Bigotry. On the menu at Red Hen Restaurant in Lexington VA. Or you can ask for the “Hate Plate”. And appetizers are “small plates for small minds” https://t.co/rHEVdcQwwh — Gov. Mike Huckabee (@GovMikeHuckabee) June 23, 2018
People took to Yelp to add their thoughts -- many of them negative -- about the restaurant and its apparent refusal to serve Sanders. The vast majority of the reviews today had little to do with the food.
"WOW. Just WOW. This restaurant discriminates if it doesn't agree with your political views," one Yelp reviewer wrote Saturday.
"You have joined a long list of people that open its rude mouth and loose. Shame on you to insult that women nationally. Now its your turn. By the way your food stinks," another reviewer wrote Saturday.
The restaurant also had its defenders. One wrote, "A restaurant that gave Sarah Huckabee Sanders a little taste of her own medicine...priceless! I must stop in soon so I can give a real review."
By the end of the day, Yelp posted a disclaimer: "This business recently made waves in the news, which often means that people come to this page to post their views on the news.
"While we don't take a stand one way or the other when it comes to these news events, we do work to remove both positive and negative posts that appear to be motivated more by the news coverage itself than the reviewer's personal consumer experience with the business."
Yelp warned that as a result, user posts could be removed as part of its "cleanup process." It welcomed users "to post your thoughts about the recent media coverage for this business on Yelp Talk at any time."
Apparently, some social media users were also mistaking a D.C. restaurant also called the Red Hen, with the Virginia restaurant. The unaffiliated D.C. restaurant issued this statement on Twitter:
