Former Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who opposed LGBT-rights every chance he had as governor, weighed in on the Chick-Fil-A controversy on Saturday. According to MSNBC:
Former Minnesota Governor and possible vice-presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty stated that he found the derisive opinions of government officials against Chick-fil-A “chilling.”
“Now you have the police power of government intimidating and threatening people, being used to intimidate and threaten people, based on their free speech rights and their religious views,” Pawlenty said Saturday at a call-in discussion in Cary, North Carolina.
“I mean it’s chilling. I mean it’s stunning, it is jaw-dropping. And so I think strong people who see this need to stand up and say no we don’t do that in the United States,” Pawlenty said.
Pawlenty made his statement after sitting down to a meal at a Chick-Fil-A on Saturday in North Carolina while stumping for Mitt Romney.
The southern fast food chicken chain is finding itself the target of a push to get the University of Minnesota to drop the chain as a vendor at the Coffman Memorial Union food court. A Change.org petition is quickly gaining steam online.
“Chick-Fil-A’s anti-gay stances have long been known, but now that they have explicitly stated their animus towards gay people, the University of Minnesota should take a stand and kick them off campus, especially because voters in Minnesota will face a marriage discrimination amendment this fall.”
The petition has already gathered 1,285 signatures. A similar petition at Mankato State has 271
Minnesota has only three of the estimated 1,600 Chick-Fil-A stores nationwide: One in Coffman, one at Mankato State University and one at the Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport.
The airport location has been under some speculation as to whether it would be targeted by protesters. Minnesota Monthly broached that subject briefly in June:
But the man who lured the company here, John Greer, the assistant director for concessions and business development at the airport, has faith. The franchise, like all the airport’s concessions, will be operated by HMS Host, which Greer says “has indicated it has no intention of using the venue to proselytize.” And he believes the restaurant will generate more revenue in six days than the previous tenants, A&W and Godfather’s Pizza, did in seven—combined. Ouch, Herman Cain. More important, after Northeastern University students in Boston voted this spring to bar the chain from campus, Chick-fil-A announced it would no longer donate to outside groups. It will still evangelize, just more discreetly. As the protests fade away, it may seem like any other chain and, the next time you’re starving at the airport, a chicken sandwich may seem simply like manna from heaven.