Free Republic

Chuck Moran, the executive director of the Pennsylvania Licensed Beverage and Tavern Association, is wearing a different hat these days. Moran said he essentially acts as a counselor, consoling owners and operators of small restaurants and taverns across the state for hours a day. The restaurateurs fear they will lose their businesses and their livelihoods as a result of restrictions placed on them to try to mitigate COVID-19. “I had one member that I was so concerned about that I referred to the National Suicide Prevention Hotline,” Moran said. “That’s how serious some of them are. They’re really desperate.” Gov....

Frustrated by Gov. Tom. Wolf’s latest COVID-19 restrictions on the food service industry, restaurant owners in central Pennsylvania are armed for a fight. Representatives from dozens of establishments gathered earlier today at Bonefish Grille in Lower Allen Township to express their dissatisfaction with the governor and his recent mandates. In the coming days, they plan to spread word about a petition demanding change. “How can one person have this much power? How can one person go across our constitution, stomp on it and never look back? And there’s nothing we can do? He has too much power,” said organizer Matt...

The national restaurant industry is bracing for a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation that could round up hundreds of migrant families that have received deportation orders. Restaurant owners and worker advocates hope the operation, planned to start on Sunday, will not disrupt an industry already hurting for staff, or broaden into a wider investigation of employees not on the Trump administration's deportation lists. President Donald Trump announced on Monday that the roundups would move forward despite debate within the administration over the potential humanitarian issues (separating children from their parents) and political fallout (alienating Democrats as Congress debates a...