A Hispanic Starbucks customer in Texas has accused a barista of targeting her with an “offensive” joke written on a coffee cup.
Blanca Lopez, who is Hispanic, had stopped at the Starbucks inside the Irving, Texas Target on June 23, grabbing a horchata latte while out with her two daughters, CBS Texas reported.
But it wasn’t her name written on the cup that caught their attention. Instead, one of her daughters noticed something scribbled across the clear lid in black marker.
“What do you call a sick eagle?” the lid read.
“Illegal,” it answered.
Lopez was left stunned, as she clearly did not find the message funny.
“When I read it, I’m like, OK. Was I supposed to laugh or what do I need to do?” she recalled. “Why did they call me that? Why are they asking if I have papers or no papers? Why did she write this? For me, like, it’s offensive.”
For Lopez, the so-called joke cut deep. She told the outlet she has friends and family members who have been deported, adding to the hurt she felt seeing the word “illegal” on her cup.
Lopez said she brought the message to the attention of the store’s manager, who promised a team meeting to ensure it would not happen again. But for Lopez, that wasn’t enough. She wants the barista fired.
“I work as a manager. If someone on my team did something like that, I would fire her immediately,” she said.
The incident soon caught the attention of Dallas activist Carlos Quintanilla, who posted on Facebook that he and others would gather at the Starbucks to meet the “author of the offensive joke.”
Quintanilla encouraged protesters to arrive at the Target at 10:00AM on June 28. An hour later, he canceled the protest after no one showed up.
Still, he walked into the store and livestreamed for his Facebook followers, searching for the Starbucks, but was told to leave by a Target employee for recording inside the building.
“It’s not easy to organize our community to raise their voice, I understand that protesting is already very difficult but acting is quite simple. Even Starbucks and Target have responded to our insistence to clarify their position on the offensive ‘ILLEGAL’ advertisement,” Quintanilla wrote.
“Let’s suspend our protest in forgiveness and let’s Protest in Silence!”
Outside the store, Quintanilla defended the immigrants living in his community, telling CBS Texas: “It’s not just inappropriate, it’s disturbing. Especially right now, when the narrative being thrown out in mass media is that if you’re illegal, you’re a criminal, and if you’re a criminal, you’re illegal.”
Starbucks has responded to the incident with a statement to CBS Texas, saying: “We want everyone in our stores to be treated with courtesy and respect; we apologize and are actively investigating and addressing this.”
The coffee giant confirmed that it is investigating the incident, and stresses that it has a zero-tolerance policy for discriminatory behavior.
