Utah agency reviewing ‘discrimination’ allegations after bar vowed to not serve Zionists

A bar owned by a former Salt Lake City mayoral candidate announced this weekend it won’t serve Zionists, in a politically charged social media post that called for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas conflict.

The post drew responses from leaders in Utah’s Jewish community, and from the Utah Department of Alcoholic Beverage Services on Wednesday, which said in a statement it notified the Utah Attorney General’s Office so it “may conduct an investigation on whether the business is violating discrimination laws.”

Salt Lake City’s Weathered Waves, 158 S. Rio Grande, posted on Instagram that Zionists are banned from its establishment.

The bar is owned by Michael Valentine, who ran in Salt Lake City’s recent mayoral race in which incumbent Mayor Erin Mendenhall won.

Valentine says he’s also running in this year’s Salt Lake County mayoral race. Salt Lake County Clerk Lannie Chapman said Valentine has not officially filed a form to be on the November ballot, but she added that the deadline for unaffiliated candidates is June 18 and write-in candidates is Sept. 3.

Business announces ban on group

“No Zionists allowed. We are a business but we are also human. We don’t make and sell cider for robots. We work so hard for Utah and Salt Lake, to build a community,” the Instagram post said.

The business went on to say it is “horrified by the ongoing genocide in Gaza and even more horrified to see so many Americans ignore and rationalize ethnic cleansing. That is why we are pleased to announce we are banning all Zionists forever from our establishments.

“Zionism is hate speech, it is white supremacy and has nothing to do with the beautiful Jewish faith. We forever stand firm with the people of Gaza and humanity. We dream of a free and prosperous Palestine,” the post said.

As of Wednesday, the post remained “pinned” to the business’ Instagram page — meaning the business has elected to keep it at the top of its page. It also had a note in its caption that it was edited, saying it will block “any further Zionist (expletive) posted on this thread.”

Zionism is the movement and “ideology to reestablish and support the existence of a Jewish state in the biblical land of Israel,” the American Jewish Committee’s website states.

Valentine also appeared at a Feb. 6 Salt Lake City Council meeting along with several other mostly pro-Palestinian supporters who showed up to ask the City Council to pass a resolution calling on a cease-fire in Gaza.

“This is not about being anti-Jewish, this is about Zionism. This is about genocide,” he said. “Please stand on the right side of history.”

The City Council ultimately approved a resolution a few weeks after that. The city took a delicate stance on the issue, simply calling for peace in the Middle East.

The American Jewish Committee says Zionists support Jews’ “right to self-determination in their historic homeland and Israel’s right to exist.” The group contends that antisemitism is often cloaked in the claim that someone is “anti-Zionist.”

“Notably, anti-Zionism — the belief that the Jewish people do not have the right to a national home in their ancestral homeland (e.g., that the state of Israel should not exist) — is itself widely believed by Jews and non-Jewish allies to be a form of antisemitism,” the American Jewish Committee says.

State agency responds

The Department of Alcoholic Beverage Services released a statement Wednesday that said it is aware a licensed bar shared messages on social media stating it will deny service to “Zionists.” The agency added that people had contacted the department with concerns. The statement did not directly name the bar.

“Today, the department notified the Utah Attorney General’s Office so they may conduct an investigation on whether the business is violating discrimination laws. At the same time, the department is reviewing its statutory obligations and legal options for responding to discrimination at (department) licensed establishments,” the department said.

It added that it “takes allegations of discrimination seriously. Safety is always the department’s top priority for everyone who interacts with licensed establishments, including patrons, employees and owners.”

In response, Weathered Waves called the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Services statement “shortsighted” and claimed it was defamatory and slanderous.

“Banning hate speech in any and all forms is not discrimination. It’s actually the opposite of that,” the bar’s post reads. The bar says Zionism is not a protected class but an ideology, and the bar bans people with the ideology to keep patrons safe.

“We expect a full retraction of this shortsighted statement as banning hate speech, being anti-genocide increases the safety of our establishment, and is not illegal in any way whatsoever,” the bar’s post said.

“And for the record, we are banning Zionists, not Jews. The exact same way we ban neo-Nazis and white supremacists and not Christians. Being religious is not an excuse or open license for racism, hate speech, and xenophobia. We have zero tolerance for it and won’t abide,” the bar said on Instagram Monday.

‘Things are getting worse for Jews in Utah’

The United Jewish Federation of Utah said in a statement it is “alarmed by the escalation of events in Utah that have normalized hate speech, exclusion and intimidation of the Jewish community in Utah. Things are getting worse for Jews in Utah.”

The group said the bar’s social media comments about banning people based on “national, ethnic, and ideological lines” is a violation of civil rights laws “at all levels.” It said it reported the business to law enforcement.

“In the guise of anti-Zionist rhetoric, this business owner is demonizing those who believe in the right of existence of a Jewish state as well as applying a double standard to Israel and our community. The results of these acts have led to direct threats upon members of our community,” the United Jewish Federation of Utah said.

Utah Rabbi Avremi Zippel also responded on X, saying he had enough people reach out to him privately that he decided to acknowledge the issue and said the bar is “probably breaking a buncha laws. Heck if I care.”

He went on to say the Yalla Kosher Food Truck is open to food lovers “of every stripe and color. And especially Zionists.”

“Trust me, you’d rather have some of our Shayetet 13 Shawarma, than some sexual assault sympathizing seltzer…” he added, seemingly referring to a recent U.N. report Monday that said there are “reasonable grounds” to believe Hamas committed rape, sexual torture and inhumane treatment of women during its Oct. 7 attack on Israel that left about 1,200 people dead, and continues to commit sexual violence.

Israel’s war against Hamas has since laid waste to the Gaza Strip, killing more than 30,000 people, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The U.N. says a quarter of Gaza’s 2.3 million people face starvation, according to The Associated Press.

In a subsequent post, the bar said Nazis, Zionists, racists, transphobes, homophobes, sexists and white supremacists are not allowed in the bar.

Contributing: Carter Williams