TownHall, the certified non-GMO and veg-friendly Ohio City restaurant owned by Bobby George and others, is among the more popular joints in the city — astoundingly successful, a favorite hangout of local athletes and coaches, and a venue for assorted events.
In that regard, the Trump fundraiser, held last Thursday afternoon, was far from an anomaly. TownHall has hosted events for Democrats and Republicans alike, as well as fundraisers for organizations such as the Providence Children’s Home and Feed the Need.
But Trump is no ordinary candidate, this no ordinary election. And cautions about politics at the dinner table, whether it’s at home or out, are true for a reason.
The event was organized by a host committee including local businessman Tony George and Cuyahoga County GOP chairman Rob Frost. Tony George is the father of Bobby George, one of TownHall’s owners. While the family and business relationships overlap, they’ve attempted to maintain distinctions publicly in the leadup to the event..
Bobby George, for instance, was initially listed as a member of the host committee that organized the fundraiser on a flier. He was not on the committee, he told Scene, and a second invitation without his name was sent out. And Cleveland.com’s original story on the announcement of the fundraiser named Tony George as a co-owner of TownHall, which he’s not. A correction was added to the article.
Bobby George, for his part, donated to Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2015, according to campaign finance reports, as well as to Republicans Marco Rubio in 2015 and Congressman Dave Joyce in 2014. And Tony George, politically active for years supporting both Republicans and Democrats, including Bill Clinton, proclaimed Trump the next president of the United States of America during his introductory remarks at the fundraiser.
All of those interests collided last week — family, business, politics.
Because a visit from this GOP presidential nominee isn’t just another example of an open door policy for both sides of the aisle. It’s a visit from the human form of Facebook Uncle for president with Twitter Egg as his running mate. This isn’t Congressman Tim Ryan, for instance, who held an event at TownHall (which, Bobby George told Scene, produced divisive reaction as well).
To host Trump is to host a man so prodigiously hateful that his campaign necessitates an entire editor’s note appended to coverage.
To host Trump (anywhere, but in this case, a heavily democratic neighborhood in a heavily democratic city) is also to tacitly invite reaction from your customers, many of whom could assume you support his campaign and ideas.
And so came the reaction on the restaurant’s Facebook page.
While those screengrabs, supplied to Scene last week, don’t capture all of the comments made that day, they do capture the range of sentiments, from disappointment to jokes, from promises to never patronize the business again to run-of-the-mill comment section reaction. There were, it should be noted, also comments containing vulgarities and personal attacks.
Those comments and the others, however, are all gone. As the internet quickly noticed last week, comments to the page were being deleted and the page scrubbed of any mention of Trump. The deletions kicked up the reaction, accelerating the spin cycle in a predictable way.
The optics weren’t great: Here’s a local business proudly hosting Donald Trump and then deleting negative reaction. Here’s a local business hosting a candidate who doesn’t quite seem to understand the First Amendment, one who openly fights against the freedom of the press, squelching speech on its page. Here’s a local business that might have expected some pushback for hosting the event then quickly realizing it had underestimated its customers (and, to be fair, non-customers, including many who don’t patronize the restaurant in the first place and might have quickly seen the fundraiser as reinforcements of their opinions).
Indeed, TownHall did suspend all commenting on its Facebook page, the restaurant’s social media manager Kayla Barnes told Scene last week in a phone call with owner Bobby George.
Their reasoning: The comments, which she characterized as splitting 50-50 in support and opposition of TownHall’s choice to hold the fundraiser, included many that were vulgar. Because, she said, the restaurant and its social media are used by families and children, they made the decision to hide all reactions. (That’s still the case as of this afternoon.)
It’s not an unreasonable decision, though one that displayed a certain short-sighted understanding of how to deal with a brewing social media storm.
Bobby George was happy to explain their thinking further on a phone call. (It mirrored what he posted last week on a vegan and vegetarian FB group.)
“We hold private fundraisers all the time,” Bobby George said, “for Republicans and Democrats. People do it on a weekly basis — that’s why I named it TownHall.”
He said he expected some reaction from hosting Trump, expected some of it to be negative, but said that there’s been plenty of positive reaction as well. “Most the feedback has been, ‘That’s cool,” or, ‘I love your crepe bar and I’ll be back,'” he said.
George said he wouldn’t tolerate personal attacks or comments like, “Fuck this guy,” on TownHall’s page, though he said he did not follow the reaction specifically in this case. “If it’s not about the business, we would remove it. Trump has nothing to do with our service and product. People can support Hillary or people who support Trump, I don’t give a shit. My job is to run a great establishment.”
In the call, he also echoed sentiments he had posted online, which said: “We wanted to create an open environment where people would not be judged for speaking their opinion. That is what makes this Country so special. We would love the opportunity to host Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton and we are working towards getting this done. In fact I have donated to Hillary’s Campaign for what it is worth. I love my business, employees and customers and do not want to do anything that would effect our ability to continue to thrive. I was hoping this FB group would see it with the same positive view that I did. Also, for those of us that our passionate about our FOOD SUPPLY, we must not alienate from any party or we will lose our voice.”
In his view, his business held an event, not an endorsement rally. He wondered how it was any different than the local businesses and restaurants that did private events during the RNC.
(One difference might be the view that the RNC was an economic driver for the entire city as well as a crowning civic moment in the national spotlight, as opposed to a one-off event two months out from the election.)
Regardless, George said he knows some people have said they’ll never come back to his restaurant. That’s their choice, he said. But he sees things going the other way and, for his part, he’s going to keep focusing on their food and mission and employees.
“I’m not scared,” he said. “From what I understand, it helped our business. It was a big boom. People are talking about it so much, and anytime people are talking about it, it helps you.”
This article appears in Sep 7-13, 2016.
Scene had an interesting profile on Tony George in May 2000 — “High Roller: How has sports bar impresario Tony George become a political player? Ego, ambition, and loads of money”.
Trump is right there with the 1rst amendment . The reason he protests so much is because the Liberals own the media, instead of how it was intend, the media not take sides.
Scene, you missed the mark of that one.
Easy to segregate, townhall
17 women and 4 men in that photo. Looks more like one of Trump’s pageants than a fundraiser
The totalitarian left strikes again. Good for you Townhall. If the liberal bigots don’t want to come to your restaurant, that’s their choice.
big·ot
ˈbiɡət/
noun
a person who is intolerant toward those holding different opinions.
That joint has always drawn hordes of pretentious moneyed assholes like shit draws flies. I won’t need to avoid the place because I’ve already been doing so, This news clinches it for me. I’m done. Won’t even step into in their john to take a piss. Unless it’s on the floor or the wall.
They neither want nor need geezers like me, and I neither need nor want Town Hall.
Nope…not even if they give me an Old Style on the house. Or two. Or three.
They kissed Trump’s ass? Then they can also kiss mine.
Chuckles the Clown
Yeah… If your venue hosts a KKK fundraiser, are you excused because you didn’t light the cross yourself?
I don’t know. Ask Hillary Clinton. She was friends with many dixiecrats/KKK members.
Wow, those must be some of the dumbest women in town.
@squid…women are not there by choice. Those are Townhall employees who are required to be there. Furthermore, TH dictates employee attire and does not subsidize any expenditure i.e. uniformed socks, shoes, etc. If an employee refuses or speaks out they are chastised for not being a true member of the “TH family” and are consequently ostracized.
What a bunch of little bitches…Liberals all they ever do is cry,judge,point fingers,and label.Oh and protest,let’s not forget about that..
Been there multiple times and won’t ever be back and neither will my so-called ‘whiny, crying, judging, finger-pointing, crying little-bitch friends!! And if I could stage a daily protest, I’d be more than thrilled to do so… There’s no shame in my game!! As far as I’m concerned, Townhall has taken a stand and made known that they fully support the hate spewed by #Drumpf. Let the haters & bigots converge on the same eating establishment and be happy – goodie for them!
The little bitches are the ones who work there, with that bitchy “wannabe rich-bitch little black dress” look…no wonder they are kissing up to Donaldo Trumpolini, AKA I Douche, and he is doing the same to them. Each is the other’s type. They deserve each other. Piss on the whole damn bunch of them.
Chuckles the Clown
Chuckles,
I think that was the most bitch-like post I’ve ever seen on here. Do you want some cheese with that whine?
I guess the main point is that there are some people that don’t think it is racist to enforce immigration laws because it is simply enforcing a law and because nationalities are not races.
Apparently the people that are saying they won’t go because “haters” go there I guess are missing the fact that those people were there all along. I guess they weren’t able to detect all of the hate.
No different then the “whiny bitchy” conservatives not going to Michael Simon’s restaurants because Trump isn’t welcomed in his restaurants. Everyone can protest everyone. I don’t care. I’ve heard all these restaurants are great, so go to the one that you like and, if it matters THAT much, supports your political agenda; conservative, democratic, green, libertarian, mormon, whatever…
Snoboard91503,
Well, I go to BSpot all the time, but it’s actually not the same. Townhall was being welcoming everyone regardless of their political candidate choice, while Symon was excluding people. Interesting how that works.
Brian Wilson. a world-famous musician who apparently enjoys wasting time spamming a Cleveland message board, experiences auditory hallucinations and has been formally diagnosed as mildly manic-depressive with schizoaffective disorder that presents itself in the form of disembodied voices.
According to him, he began having hallucinations in 1965, shortly after experimenting with psychedelic drugs
In recent years, Wilson’s mental condition has improved, although he still has auditory hallucinations from time to time. In 1984, Wilson had been diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenic, with doctors finding evidence of brain damage caused by excessive and sustained drug abuse.
Chuckles the Clown
That was funny Chuck, but my posts aren’t SPAM. Zero-content posts like your whiny post are SPAM.
SMiLE Chuckles!
Sorry for the delayed reply. I was reading your posting history.
Pick up your phone and contact First Call for Help, at 211. Do it now.
Chuckles the Clown
Thanks Chuck,
I figured you were a bigot since you can’t be accepting of other views. Sorry for being logical n’shit.
Chuckles, Chuckles, Chuckles….. so much to learn. Now just scoot yourself on over to Town Hall and buy some drinks and toast to free speech. Please don’t be a bigot and only allow the liberal point of view to be heard. You seem to only support free speech if it supports your point of view. C’mon, open your mind and drink up!
I think this was handled poorly by Townhall, but I certainly don’t think it’s the end of the world. Townhall hosted an event for the Republican nominee for president. Townhall has hosted other events and talks on a wide range of topics that cross the political spectrum, so the owner certainly has a point. However, it seems obvious that they wanted to play both sides here. They wanted to hide it because they knew it would be controversial, yet they took a picture and made it look like an endorsement with the #Trump2016.
With a little more honesty and a thought out process, they could have avoided much of the controversy. Announce the event, say it’s private, and say they are hosting and it’s not an endorsement, yadda yadda. Let people comment but make a statement that any offensive comments will be deleted and lay out what offensive means.
If you actually think about what Townhall claims to be passionate about (healthy clean eating, GMO free, etc), the correct presidential candidate is Jill Stein (or Bernie Sanders). Clinton would honestly be a worse choice for that mission than Trump because she has close ties to Monsanto.
Just some thoughts.
I really don’t see how this is a free speech issue. The government isn’t punishing Town Hall for hosting Trump, their customers are.
I don’t see anything to do with not supporting free speech. It’s Trump I don’t support. So anyone who does anything in favor of Trump…especially raising money (as though he needs it)…goes on my shit list.
I don’t buy drinks or do business at establishments that openly support conservatives…and I don’t drink with conservatives, if I can avoid it. Waste of time and booze, even if they’re paying for it. A case of Old Styles wouldn’t be enough to get me into Town Hall at this point.
Chuckles the Clown
Libtards? That’s the best you can do? Seriously? So 2000s…time get a new wingnut dictionary if you can’t come up with anything better than an overused slur from the Oughts.
You’re lame and out of touch, Maureen. Just like most conservatives are. Also on the wrong side of history. You are going to lose. Again.
Chuckles the Clown
I don’t buy chicken sandwiches at ChickFilla, and now I don’t have to go to Townhall anymore. I’m sure there are many establishments I frequent who support causes I am against, but they don’t throw it in my face and help fascists collect donations to run for President.
BTW, we as Americans should be OUTRAGED that our political choices are this terrible for the coming election. Why is no one doing anything about this? I can’t believe this is where our political climate has settled. We should be OUTRAGED. I’m not voting this year…or eating at Townhall.
They didn’t raise money for Donald Trump, dufus. They let someone throw a party at their restaurant, because they are like a business and stuff.
OLD STYLE IS THE BEST
The more you talk though, you show more bigotry. Holy crap.
Bye, Felicia…[ insert wave icon]
Chuckles the Clown
Wow complaining about someone deleting something but cool with Hillary? How prodigiously hypocritical…….
I think providing a venue for a fundraiser isn’t in and of itself a bad thing…as long as the restaurant got paid (up front…dealing with Trump, ya know). But hosting? That sounds like more than just making money, and more like endorsing. And then instead of doing it quietly, you post a photo and use extra exclamation points? That’s more than just doing business, and it was inviting comment. Nobody would have cared if you had been less gushy.
We should be less concerned about what he thinks politically and more about Joe he hires sex offenders as managers at his restaurants
HOW VERY INTERESTING THAT NOW TONY GEORGE THREATENED COUNCIL MEMBER’S JOBS IF THEY ENFORCED ANTI DISCRIMINATION LAWS. BIGOTRY IS ALIVE AND WELL WITH THE OWNERS/PARTNERS OF TH. OH AND LET’S NOT FORGET THE SILENT PARTNER SEAN THE PEDOPHILE, WHO WHEN I LAST CHECKED, STILL COLLECTS $$$ FROM THE HARRY BUFFALOS. GREAT JOB, TRUMP HUMPERS.YOU KEEP SUPPORTING A BIGOT WHO PROMOTES SEXUAL ASSAULT!