White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders is using her official government position to attack the restaurant that kicked her out.
Sanders used her press secretary Twitter account, not her personal account to tweet about what a big meanie the restaurant owner was:
Last night I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left. Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so
— Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) June 23, 2018
This means that her tweet was made as an official statement from the White House that was basically telling Trump supporters to go after this restaurant.
The White House communications staff has also been tweeting about this:
Looks like the @WhiteHouse press shop is making a concerted push to highlight @PressSec’s getting tossed from a restaurant last night. pic.twitter.com/Vj2EPar350
— Kenneth P. Vogel (@kenvogel) June 23, 2018
The problem is that their actions are an abuse of their position:
This is an official US Gov’t social media account that is intended for use for official purposes. Ordinary gov’t employees who used an official social media account to broadcast a personal gripe about an off-duty experience with a private business would face disciplinary action. https://t.co/e6uPqLcBqV
— Col. Morris Davis (@ColMorrisDavis) June 23, 2018
In any other administration, Sanders would have been facing termination, but this is Donald Trump we’re talking about, so the White House press team has piled on in an effort to turn this into an issue that they use to distract people from the fact that most of the kids in Trump’s child detention centers have not been, and may never be, reunited with their parents.
The abuse of power begins in the Oval Office, but it is a thread that runs through the entire Trump White House.
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