Photo by Matthew Claybrook

The senate of the Student Government Association (SGA) passed a resolution unanimously on Wednesday that recommended that Chick-fil-A is removed from the rotation at Revolve.

The resolution followed recent discussion on-campus regarding Chick-fil-A’s history of supporting anti-LGBTQ+ organizations as well as a forum held on Wednesday, April 17, co-hosted by the Trinitonian and the Dean of Student’s Office.

“Chick-fil-A has donated $1.8 million to anti-LGBTQIA organizations in the past available tax return form available, which is from 2017. Those include the Paul Anderson Youth Home, Salvation Army, the Fellowship for Christian Athletes,” said sophomore senator Claire Carlson. “Also, we know about the Uganda scandal in 2014 with the anti-homosexuality bill that Chick-fil-A supported different interest groups in that that were advocating for that legislation. In addition to that, Dan Cathy, who is their CEO, has made a lot of problematic comments in the contexts of same sex marriage and things like that.”

Carlson, along with fellow sophomore senators Carson Bolding and Leopoldo Perez, drafted the resolution, which was presented to the senate for approval.

“As far as resolutions go, it would be sent out to the student body, it would express our opinion, it would not directly enable change,” said junior Ty Tinker, president of SGA, at Wednesday’s meeting. “This is not something that immediately, student administrators say, ‘OK, SGA passed this resolution therefore we have to do this or we’ll get in some sort of trouble.’ That’s not how it goes. This is just a statement of our beliefs and our understanding of the situation.”

Bolding explained their next steps now that the senate approved the resolution.

“We can basically give a recommendation to the administration that they may or may not follow, and I think that mostly just goes to giving it to dean Tuttle and Jamie Thompson and them giving it to the appropriate people,” Bolding said.

Carlson explained why Chick-fil-A’s presence on campus is detrimental.

“Obviously it has the potential to make a lot of people feel uncomfortable on campus, and also it looks really bad for Trinity in the context of recruiting potential students who may be a part of the LGBTQ community,” Carlson said.

Carlson explained why the resolution was a good path of action following the forum.

“There’s a lot of people who mentioned [at the forum] that doing a majority vote isn’t the best idea because obviously not everybody is affected in the same manner by having Chick-fil-A on campus,” Carlson said. “Additionally, we decided to do a resolution because in the past we’ve done resolutions for things like the menstrual projects in public restrooms, which is something Simone [Washington] headed, and we’ve also done them for open educational resources … And these are things that have gone through the administration and have worked in the past, so we’re hoping that if we do a resolution about it that it will have the same effect.”

Tinker explained that this resolution is important.

“Resolutions are passed for a number of reasons. We had a resolution several years ago that was as simple as removing the [bollards] from behind the Bell Center,” Tinker said. “This is a little bit more complex, a little bit more of a statement of beliefs I’d say, not just a tactical facilities services thing, it’s more of a discussion that has been rotating around campus quite a bit, so it’s really important that we do it right and do it tastefully.”

The full resolution can be read here.