DC food workers vow Trump officials won't feel welcomed when dining out in nation's capital

close

Video

Trump named TIME 2024 Person of the Year

President-elect Donald Trump was named the TIME 2024 Person of the Year Thursday morning. The 'Fox & Friends' co-hosts reacted to the announcement and what they call the 'Trump effect' as a majority of Americans are hopeful ahead of the new year.

Food workers in Washington, D.C., pledged to refuse service and cause other inconveniences for members of the incoming Trump administration when they dine out over the next four years.

Industry veterans, bartenders and servers in the nation's capital told the Washingtonian that resistance to the Republican figures in the progressive city was inevitable and a matter of conscience. 

Bartenders and servers in the report promised to shun certain officials or employ other small acts of resistance against these figures to take their "power back."

WASHINGTON, D.C., POLITICAL BAR TAKES DOWN REPUBLICAN SYMBOL AFTER FIERCE BACKLASH

Restaurant workers in Washington, D.C., promised Trump officials would not feel welcome dining out over the next four years. (iStock)

"This person theoretically has the power to take away your rights, but I have the power to make you wait 20 minutes to get your entrée," Nancy, a fine-dining bartender, told the Washingtonian.

"There’s a lot of opportunities for us as workers to feel like we’re taking our power back, while not necessarily ruining someone’s life. Giving them a subtle inconvenience feels like a little bit of a win for us," she continued.

Nancy said she would refuse service to certain Trump officials. If her employer tried to force her, she claimed she would quit "on the spot."

"There is power in making it known that you’re not comfortable with a situation, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be this big dramatic show," she said. "It’s just little bits of resistance that add up, and little bits of resistance that other people will see and hopefully feel empowered to stand on those convictions as well."

"You expect the masses to just ignore RFK eating at Le Diplomate on a Sunday morning after a few mimosas and not to throw a drink in his face?," said Zac Hoffman, a DC restaurant veteran who is now a manager at the National Democratic Club. Hoffman does not work at Le Diplomate, a representative of which told Fox News Digital, "his sentiments do not at all reflect the values or actions of our staff, management, or patrons, and no interaction like the one he described would occur at any of our properties."

"For over 10 years, Le Diplomate has opened its doors to both Democrats and Republicans, and our managers and all employees are highly trained and highly professional with high standards of hospitality service," a spokesperson for Starr Restaurants, which owns Le Diplomate, told Fox News Digital. "Our patrons come from all political walks of life on a daily basis, and we take pride in providing a safe, apolitical space for all to dine, converse and build bridges."

Suzannah Van Rooy, a server at Beuchert’s Saloon on Capitol Hill, also vowed to refuse service to Trump officials whom she felt held moral views that opposed her own, according to the Washingtonian.

The Capitol Building is seen from the National Mall in Washington D.C. on Friday, August 9, 2024. (Aaron Schwartz/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)

CLICK HERE FOR MORE COVERAGE OF MEDIA AND CULTURE

"I personally would refuse to serve any person in office who I know of as being a sex trafficker or trying to deport millions of people," she said. 

"It’s not, ‘Oh, we hate Republicans.’ It’s that this person has moral convictions that are strongly opposed to mine, and I don’t feel comfortable serving them," Van Rooy added.

The restaurant said after publication that Van Rooy had been terminated for her remarks.

Another anonymous host at a fine dining restaurant said she planned to look up every Trump administration figure online so she could know who they were and give them a bad table if they came in.

"I’ll only give them a bad table but will otherwise guarantee decent and polite service," she went on. "I feel like them getting a bad table is nothing compared to the harm they’ll be inflicting."

NEW YORK, NEW YORK - DECEMBER 12: President-elect Donald Trump speaks at a reception at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) after being named TIME’s "Person of the Year" for the second time on December 12, 2024 in New York City.  (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Not every liberal worker in the report planned to protest the incoming administration while doing their job, however. 

A bartender named Joseph said while he was disappointed by the election results, he was looking forward to higher tips with more Republicans in Washington.

"I think my tip average from Republicans—at least ones that I or a coworker has recognized—is close to 30 percent. With Dems, I’m surprised if it’s over 20," he told the Washingtonian, adding that Republicans tend to be lower maintenance patrons as well. 

These comments beckon memories of Trump's first time in office, when Republican Party figures were harassed while dining at D.C.-area restaurants.

Then-White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and her family were kicked out of a Virginia restaurant and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was heckled and harassed at a Mexican Washington D.C. restaurant in 2018.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP 

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders was kicked out of a Virginia restaurant in 2018, when she served as Trump's press secretary. (Getty Images)

A few months later, Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and his wife were also chased out of D.C. restaurant by left-wing protesters.

Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., encouraged supporters after the two incidents to fight back against the Trump administration. She said at the time current administration officials who defend Trump "know what they’re doing is wrong" and said they soon won’t be able to peacefully appear in public without being harassed. She later backed off from those remarks.

Fox News' Bradford Betz contributed to this report.