Chick-fil-A CEO Avoids Question on Company’s Stance on LGBTQ+ Rights
Chick-fil-A’s CEO Andrew Cathy had the chance to say the company supported LGBTQ+ people. He didn’t.
In a recent interview on the Today show, Chick-fil-A CEO Andrew Cathy, whose father made headlines in 2012 when he spoke out against marriage equality, did little to dispel notions that the fast-food company was anti-LGBTQ+.
Referencing the times since 2012 when Cathy’s father, Dan Cathy, made the comments, Today co-host Craig Melvin asked Cathy, “There were folks who were protesting; they were boycotting Chick-fil-A. They’d say, ‘Oh, Chick-fil-A, they don’t stand with the LGBTQ+ community.’ What would you say to those folks?”
“Well, for anybody who hadn’t tried us, we’d love for you to come try and have our great-tasting food and the hospitality that we are known for,” Cathy said. “I think that everybody that would be willing to walk in the door, they’ll see that they’re welcome to come eat with us.”
Cathy didn’t tell Today that LGBTQ+ people were specifically welcome or that the company’s position has changed.
“You don’t want to talk about that chapter in Chick-fil-A’s history,” Melvin asked.
Cathy responded again, focusing on inviting everyone in.
“We’re focused on serving everybody that comes in and eats with us,” he said.
Melvin then asked Cathy about Cathy Chick-fil-A’s “official position on equal rights.”
“We’re focused on hospitality, serving great tasting food and great service,” Cathy responded.
Dan Cathy’s statements included saying that the company supported “the biblical definition of the family unit.” He also said, “I think we are inviting God’s judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at him and say, ‘We know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage,’” the New York Times reported.
Today noted that Dan Cathy regretted sharing his opinion on the issue.
Besides the comments in 2012, the company’s foundation gave almost $2 million to groups with anti-marriage equality stances in 2019, according to the Independent. It later said it would not donate to some of those groups again.
Chick-fil-A has been an evangelically Christian-aligned business since its beginning in 1967, when it was founded by Cathy’s grandfather, S. Truett Cathy, in Atlanta, Georgia.
“It’s our anchor in the sense of what our corporate purpose states: that we’re in business to glorify God by being a faithful steward of all that’s entrusted to us, and have a positive influence on all who come in contact with Chick-fil-A,” Cathy told Today’s Melvin.
Many have called out Cathy for his responses to the questions.
“A non answer answer. This is what his father Dan Cathy said in 2012. ‘We are very much supportive of the family — the biblical definition’ A good follow up would have been: ‘Do you agree with [your] father?’” said former Today co-host Katie Couric.
