“You can’t have a test for what the owners’ personal views are before you decide to give a permit to do something in the city. Bloomberg said of his mayoral colleagues. “They’re all friends but I disagree with them really strongly on this one,” Mr. Bloomberg said it’s “a bad idea and it’s not going to happen” on John Gambling’s radio show this morning. Remarkably, the voice of sanity in all of this has been New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who has become infamous for Nanny State rules of his own:Īs mayors around the country - including Boston’s, Chicago’s and San Francisco’s - are backing efforts to keep the fast food chain out of their cities due to the company’s president, Dan Cathy, spending millions to push back against gay marriage, Mr. Mayor Vincent Gray said the chain wasn’t welcome in the nation’s capital and referred to it as “hate chicken.” Boston Mayor Tom Menino was on the record even before Moreno was, but subsequently backed down when he realized that he had no legal authority to keep Chick-fil-A out of Boston. San Francisco’s Mayor noted that the closest Chick-Fil-A to his city was 40 miles away and warned them not to come any closer. Moreno has been joined by other politicians around the country eager to jump on this country and prove, well, prove that they’re better than the rest of us. But my belief in equality is resolute, and if I were to take the easy way out and turn a blind eye to his remarks, I would be turning my back on the principles I stand for. Obviously, Cathy has the right to believe, say and give money to whatever cause he wants. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. “We are very much supportive of the family - the biblical definition of the family unit. In an interview with the Biblical Recorder, he was asked about the company’s fervent support of the traditional family. Although I thought we had made some progress, Cathy’s anti-gay comments made it abundantly clear what the company’s true stance is toward equal rights. During each meeting, I challenged the company to change its ways. I was repeatedly told by company officials that “we (Chick-fil-A) are not political” and that the company “had no political agenda.” Just recently, an attorney for the chain tried to convince me of Chick-fil-A’s benevolence. My concerns were based on financial contributions made by WinShape Foundation, Chick-fil-A’s charitable endeavor, to anti-gay groups. Every time we met, I brought up my concerns that the company supported a homophobic agenda. I’ve been in discussions with the company for the past nine months.
Because of this man’s ignorance, I will deny Chick-fil-A a permit to open a restaurant in my ward. There are consequences for one’s actions, statements and beliefs. But then I heard the bigoted, homophobic comments by Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy, who recently came out against same-sex marriage. Initially, I had some traffic concerns with their plan. But to subdivide the land, the companies need my approval. It would be the fast-food chain’s first “stand-alone” Chicago restaurant. Home Depot in the 2500 block of North Elston Avenue wants to sell a piece of its land so that a Chick-fil-A restaurant can open in the 1st Ward, where I am alderman. While Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel has backed down somewhat from his previous statements that Chick-fil-A isn’t welcome in Chicago, the Chicago Alderman who originally came up with the idea is doubling down on his insistence that he will block the company from expanding into his war solely because of the position that its President takes on same-sex marriage: