In the Crumb and Get It bakery incident (August 15, 2012), a bakery owner in
Radford, Virginia
Radford (formerly Lovely Mount, Central City, English Ferry and Ingle's Ferry) is an independent city in the U.S. state of Virginia. As of 2020, the population was 16,070 by the United States Census Bureau. For statistical purposes, the Bureau ...
, declined to host a campaign event for then-
Vice President
A vice president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vice president is on ...
Joe Biden, citing political differences. The incident sparked significant media coverage and a surge in business for the bakery. The baker was invited to introduce Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan at a political rally the following week.
The incident
Just after 10:00am on Wednesday, August 15, 2012, an advance team from Joe Biden's campaign entered the three-month old "mom-and-pop" Crumb and Get It bakery, asking owner Chris McMurray if he would host an unscheduled media event, but McMurray politely declined, citing political differences. McMurray said that the exchange was very kind—not heated, hoarse, or ill-mannered—a matter of political difference ("convictions about my faith" and then-President Obama's attitude toward business), with no offense to Biden. McMurray later explained that he "would not like to be used as a
WDBJ
WDBJ (channel 7) is a television station licensed to Roanoke, Virginia, United States, serving as the CBS affiliate for the Roanoke– Lynchburg market. It is owned by Gray Television alongside Danville-licensed MyNetworkTV affiliate WZBJ, chan ...
,
Roanoke, Virginia
Roanoke ( ) is an independent city in the U.S. state of Virginia. At the 2020 census, the population was 100,011, making it the 8th most populous city in the Commonwealth of Virginia and the largest city in Virginia west of Richmond. It is ...
, received a tip about the occurrence, a resultant story being picked up by the
Drudge Report
The Drudge Report (stylized as DRUDGE REPORT) is a U.S.-based news aggregation website founded by Matt Drudge, and run with the help of Charles Hurt and Daniel Halper. The site was generally regarded as a conservative publication, though its ow ...
and various conservative blogs. The coverage led to an outpouring of support and a surge in business the next day that caused it to close down at 1:15pm because it ran out of food. McMurray opened shops in Fredericksburg and Lakeland before later shutting its doors.
McMurray's disagreement stemmed in part from his reaction to Obama's " You didn't build that" remark the previous month in Roanoke. Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan requested that McMurray introduce him at a rally in Roanoke the following week, when McMurray told the crowds "We (small business owners) did build it". Three non-partisan fact-checkers subsequently found Obama's remark to refer to
public infrastructure
Public infrastructure is infrastructure owned or available for use by the public (represented by the government). It is distinguishable from generic or private infrastructure in terms of policy, financing, purpose, etc.
Public infrastructure is ...
and not to the small businesses themselves.
Reports that
Secret Service
A secret service is a government agency, intelligence agency, or the activities of a government agency, concerned with the gathering of intelligence data. The tasks and powers of a secret service can vary greatly from one country to another. For ...
agents subsequently entered and thanked McMurray "for standing up and saying no" and "bought a whole bunch of cookies and cupcakes" were later contradicted by a Secret Service spokesman who said the agents were there to thank the shop owners for their trouble and apologize for any inconvenience the advance team may have caused.
The Crumb and Get It incident "re-entered the national conversation" after the 2018
Red Hen restaurant controversy
The Red Hen restaurant controversy was an American political controversy that began June 22, 2018, when a co-owner of The Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Virginia, asked Donald Trump's White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders to leav ...
. At that time, the owner of an unrelated Pennsylvania bakery of the same name reported being "slammed with messages" concerning the incident in Virginia six years earlier.
Similar incidents
The Crumb and Get It incident was among similar incidents that "re-entered the national conversation" in the wake of the 2018
Red Hen restaurant controversy
The Red Hen restaurant controversy was an American political controversy that began June 22, 2018, when a co-owner of The Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Virginia, asked Donald Trump's White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders to leav ...
.
In the 2012 '' Masterpiece Cakeshop'' incident, a Colorado baker refused to make a customized wedding cake for a gay couple due to the owner's religious opposition to their marriage.
In 2015, a county clerk in Kentucky,
Kim Davis
Kimberly Jean Davis (; born September 17, 1965) is a former county clerk for Rowan County, Kentucky, who gained international attention in August 2015 when she defied a U.S. federal court order to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. ...
, refused on personal religious grounds to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
In the June 2018
Red Hen restaurant controversy
The Red Hen restaurant controversy was an American political controversy that began June 22, 2018, when a co-owner of The Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Virginia, asked Donald Trump's White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders to leav ...
Sarah Huckabee Sanders
Sarah Elizabeth Huckabee Sanders (born August 13, 1982) is an American former political spokesperson and the governor-elect of Arkansas. She was the 31st White House press secretary, serving under President Donald Trump from 2017 to 2019. She ...
to leave the restaurant. Contrasting with the generally positive reaction received by McMurray, after Sanders tweeted about the incident, the restaurant quickly became the object of an online
troll
A troll is a being in Nordic folklore, including Norse mythology. In Old Norse sources, beings described as trolls dwell in isolated areas of rocks, mountains, or caves, live together in small family units, and are rarely helpful to human be ...
campaign, extreme
Yelp
Yelp Inc. is an American company that develops the Yelp.com website and the Yelp mobile app, which publish crowd-sourced reviews about businesses. It also operates Yelp Guest Manager, a table reservation service. It is headquartered in San F ...
reviews, and a negative tweet from
President Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...