Possible 2020 presidential candidate Howard Schultz was confronted on Wednesday by the woman who last year recorded the viral video of a Starbucks manager calling the police on two black men in a Philadelphia store of the coffee chain.
Schultz was discussing the incident during the Philadelphia stop of his national book tour when Philadelphia resident Melissa DePino stood up.
“My name’s Melissa, I’m the person who videotaped and shared that, the arrest in your store and I pledged after that day that I would not stay silent when I heard something,” DePino said.
“And very respectfully, I need to say to you, you are not describing the incident accurately. And the way you are describing it is perpetuating the problem,” she said. “I know you want to be part of the solution, and I hope you will be, but when you say that there were words between the two of them and she felt threatened, that didn’t happen. I saw it with my own two eyes, I was there.”
A surprised Schultz told DePino he had “great respect” for her and what she did. The billionaire then explained how he had been counseled to downplay the role of race in the situation before sitting down for an interview last April with CBS’s Gayle King, but he couldn’t because he had asked the manager whether she would have reported the men had they been white and she said probably not.”
“And so once I heard that, I knew that what occurred was a form of racial profiling,” he said. “And I was advised that you can’t possibly say that on national TV because that’s going to damage the company, the equity of the brand, you shouldn’t do that. But once I knew what she said, I felt I had a moral obligation to say the truth.”
The two African-American men, then 23, were arrested last April for sitting in the store as they waited for a business associate without first buying a menu item. They settled a lawsuit with the city last May for $1 each. While their settlement with Starbucks is confidential, they pledged to use $200,000 for an incubator program encouraging young entrepreneurs like themselves. That month 8,000 Starbucks locations across the U.S. were closed for an afternoon so the company’s almost 175,000 employees could undergo compulsory training.
During the Philadelphia event, moderated by conservative commentator Bill Kristol, Schultz also addressed criticism he received for saying on Tuesday during a CNN town hall that he has never seen color.
“I grew up, as I said earlier, in public housing in a very diverse area where there were 80-90 families in one building and a single elevator. And as a young boy, I didn’t see color. My parents were not people who in any way were prejudiced and that’s how I grew up. And I said something like that last night and it was misinterpreted,” he said.
Schultz has come under fire since announcing in January that he is seriously considering a third-party campaign for the White House. Democrats have been vocal in their concern that he may be a spoiler in the race, pulling enough votes away from their nominee and re-electing President Trump.
