The president is taking heat from some on the left after he served Chick-fil-A to a group of athletes.
On Monday, Donald Trump offered up fried and grilled chicken sandwiches from the quick service restaurant to the champions on the North Dakota State Bison football team, according to CNN.
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Terry Gilchrist, feminist editor for The Advocate, rebuked Trump for giving the football players food from the “virulently anti-LGBTQ company Chick-fil-A.”
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And Bil Browning of LGBTQ Nation described Trump as the president “who has attacked the LGBTQ community the most,” which is not entirely true, given his administration recently launched a global campaign to see homosexuality decriminalized, particularly in the Middle East.
Browning also criticized Chick-fil-A for “opposing LGBTQ rights.”
Progressives’ complaints about Chick-fil-A stem from a statement the Atlanta-based restaurant’s CEO, Dan Cathy, made in 2012, when he described his personal beliefs about marriage, a union he said can only be between one man and one woman.
“I think we are inviting God’s judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at him and say, ‘We know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage,’” he said at the time. “I pray God’s mercy on our generation that has such a prideful, arrogant attitude to think that we have the audacity to define what marriage is about.”
Though it has since ceased making these donations, in 2010, Chick-fil-A, through its nonprofit WinShape Foundation, donated about $2 million to groups theologically opposed to same-sex marriage.
What else?
The criticism of Trump and his decision to serve Chick-fil-A during the White House event came not long after Cynthia Newman, dean of the school of business at Rider University in New Jersey, resigned from her job after the college cited Chick-fil-A’s “opposition to the LGBTQ+ community” in its explanation for not considering the restaurant as a potential on-campus eating option.
During an interview with Faithwire earlier this week, Newman said she had no problem with the school removing Chick-fil-A from its list of dining options. Her beef was with administrators’ suggestion that those whose views align with Chick-fil-A’s Christian standards are somehow not upright citizens.
Rider officials encouraged faculty and staff to tell critics the reason Chick-fil-A won’t be on campus is because the college “seeks to produce individuals that are responsible citizens.”
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“The implication [in that talking point] is that, if you have values that align with Chick-fil-A’s, you’re not a responsible citizen,” Newman explained. “It was the implication in light of that first statement … that caused me to have a problem.”
Newman’s resignation will be effective Aug. 31. She will then return to her tenured faculty position, where she plans to be even more outspoken about religious liberty. She said it’s important to “have civil dialogue and disagreement without disrespect.”