In January 2026, a number of restaurant owners decided to lash out at President Donald Trump and his operations to deport criminal illegal aliens residing in the United States by opposing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers by refusing to serve them. However, their strategy didn’t work out as they had planned.
Anton Kinloch, owner of craft cocktail bar and restaurant Lone Wolf, located in Kingston, New York, posted a sign outside of his establishment on the sidewalk that read, “WE LOVE ICE IN DRINKS. WE DON’T LOVE ICE IN REAL LIFE. SOLIDARITY ALWAYS.” Lisa Dy, his wife and business partner, joined him in his decision to leave his business open on January 30 despite calls for a national shutdown to protest against ICE.
Rather than close up shop, they opted to donate a portion of their revenue for the night to a local immigrant advocacy group. Due to the winter seasons curtailing much of his business, Kinloch said he couldn’t afford to close for the night. But he, like many other business owners in a similar situation, decided that they needed to voice their opposition to Trump enforcing immigration law, especially after the shooting deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good.
Other members of the community were not thrilled by Kinloch’s activism. A few hours after putting out the signs, he found them vandalized, thrown out into the street. The wooden frame of the sign was splintered, the chalkboard surface shattered. According to The Guardian, the sign appeared to have been run over by a car. The restaurant owner posted about his support for illegal aliens on social media and got slammed by commenters.
“I spoke to other business owners in the area, and they said that they had received similar threats,” he told the outlet. “They also saw a decline in their social media followers after speaking out. People were unfollowing them, blocking them and sending them hate messages.” Jamie Kenyon, the top chef and partner of Bottino, a restaurant located in New York City had a similar experience.
Kenyon said that within minutes of publishing a pro-immigrant post on the restaurant’s social media page on the day of the shutdown, his business started getting obscenity-filled phone calls from strangers condemning his post. The post, which read in part, “We are all immigrants,” also revealed plans to donate 15% of sales to the National Immigration Justice Center.
One individual commented on the post, “One less place to visit.” Another wrote, “Maybe when some illegal sets you on fire you’ll grasp why.” Others angry with the anti-ICE activism left one-star Google reviews on the restaurant’s page. One said of the establishment, “Their horrendous values and morals do not represent us. They are extremely hateful and immoral. Would not go here under any circumstances.”
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Pizza Matta, located in Chicago’s Logan Square, refused to serve someone who supported ICE after an intense dispute broke out between the customer and co-owner Jason Vincent. According to Vincent, the customer had been leaving the restaurant harassing, politically-charged messages on Instagram for months. The conflict hit a new level when the customer came in to order pizza on the same day that Liam Ramos, 5, was taken into custody by ICE agents. After the two got into a heated argument, Vincent told the customer he had to leave, saying, “I refuse to cook for fascists and their enablers.”