Texas Restaurant Association faces backlash over keynote speaker Gov. Greg Abbott

"The Texas Restaurant Association is a non-partisan organization that works with elected officials of all political parties to strengthen the food and beverage industry in Texas," said TRA CEO and President Emily Williams Knight, Ed. D. in a statement. "As in past years, we invited a diverse group of these elected officials—Republican and Democrat—to the Texas Restaurant Show to discuss the initiatives we championed together to help save restaurants over the past two-and-a-half years of the COVID-19 pandemic and what may lie ahead for our economy."

It would have been the first TRA event Elizondo cooked for, but she says that as a woman, an immigrant, a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipient, and someone who supports abortion rights, she decided she could not participate.

"Republicans just don't support immigrants and Dreamers," she said, upset that the TRA is aligning itself with Abbott. "It's a huge slap in the face for us because the restaurant industry is run by us," she said.

Andrea Arana, the owner of soon-to-open Las Perras Cafe, was not surprised to learn that the governor is a keynote speaker at the TRA's Restaurant Show this weekend. "I've lived in Texas and worked in hospitality for the last 10 years and I've never really seen them do anything that's actually helped the average employee," Arana said, adding that the group instead helps restaurant owners continue to exploit and profit from their employees.

As a manager in Texas restaurants, Arana has seen owners discriminate against undocumented, Black and LGBTQ employees. "[The TRA is] actively giving money to politicians who would vote to see these groups obliterated from the face of the earth," she said.

Both Elizondo and Arana learned about the Restaurant Show line-up, and the TRA's political donations, from the social media posts of Alex Negranza, a veteran restaurant and bar professional who's now the president of new nonprofit Gay & Lesbian Alliance for Spirited Sipping (GLASS). He had been following the TRA since the beginning of the pandemic, when it was one of the main groups helping the Texas restaurant industry survive through relief funds and other initiatives. This week, he was surprised to see an announcement on TRA's Instagram about Gov. Abbott being the Restaurant Show's keynote speaker.

Negranza commented on the post, but he says it was deleted by the TRA's account, and all comments were later disabled on Instagram. The Twitter announcement is set to only allow accounts that the TRA mentions reply. Minutes after his first comment, Negranza says the TRA Instagram account blocked him. He thought it was strange and dove deeper into the association's political donations, posting screenshots of them on his Instagram stories.

"I called Greg Abbott an a–hole and a bigot," Negranza recalled about the now-deleted Instagram comment. "And I said that their keynote speaker did not represent the values of restaurants, that he was anti-immigration, anti-reproductive rights, his platform is anti-LGBT. Everything that Abbott represents is so against the beauty and culture that is restaurants."

Negranza also notes the significant number of people in Houston's restaurant community that are hosting fundraisers and leading other initiatives after the repeal of Roe v. Wade, which the governor celebrated. While he thinks some the TRA's legislative accomplishments have been positive in terms of economic impact to restaurants, he's upset that they are "turning a blind eye" to other issues that he and his peers are affected by.

"Our speakers, including Governor Abbott, were critical to the passage of TRA priority bills that allowed restaurants to sell alcohol to-go, save millions of dollars in franchise and unemployment insurance taxes, and gain groundbreaking transparency protections in the third-party delivery market," said TRA CEO Williams Knight.

Elizondo says she was raised never to mix business with politics, but the current political climate has spurred her to use her business as a platform to make a difference. The TRA was going to give Elizondo a $400 stipend after the event, but that wouldn't have covered everything. "I was still taking money and time out of my pocket," she said. She had already bought all of the ingredients for crab salad tostadas—they will now be a special on Cochinita's menu this weekend.