Maryland Black Man Alleges Racism After Chick-fil-A Workers Label His Order with ‘Monkeys’

A guy from Maryland is speaking out about what he says happened at his local Chick-fil-A. He says that when he got his drive-through order, it was marked with the word “Monkeys.”

The people who work at Chick-fil-A’s drive-through will often ask customers their names to make sure they get the right order, especially when there are two lanes open.

But Marquise Vanzego told TODAY last week that when he got his order from the LaPlata store on August 2, he didn’t see “Marquise” on the bag. He saw “monkeys.”

Black Vanzego said that the event made his heart “sting a little” because he thinks it was an attack on his race.

Vanzego said, “You start to think about all the other cases of racial profiling that may have happened that you heard about in the news.”

Vanzego parked and went into the restaurant after seeing the name. He said he talked to the manager, who told him they were sorry and would return his order.

“I am going to write a letter to my boss about this.” “This is rude,” Vanzego told the boss in an Instagram video of the conversation.

It can be seen on the tape that Vanzego also tried to talk to the person working at the drive-through, but the manager wouldn’t let him.

Some people have thought about the video and wondered if it was because of a broken intercom system. Vanzego told TODAY that he placed his order with a “young white male” who was standing outside taking orders.

Vanzego said, “I think he should be held responsible for what he did.”

Vanzego said that the store owner, John Flatley, told him that the worker wasn’t going to be fired because they were under 18 and had only written down the name they heard.

“This Chick-fil-A is owned and run by an independent franchisee.” The business owner of this Chick-fil-A has apologized to the customer, Chick-fil-A’s company marketing department told TODAY. “But this experience doesn’t live up to our hopes and is unacceptable.”

Vanzego thinks that the worker will become more “socially aware” after all of this.

“I get it. He’s only 17, so he’s still learning.” “But he also needs to know that bad things happen when you act that way,” Vanzego said.