He spoke about a recent RHA vote regarding the Chick-fil-A location in the Herman B Wells library.
“A student-run panel voted 18-9 to cut ties with the fast food chain based on concerns over the company’s views on same-sex marriage and other LGBT issues,” Fox and Friends host Elisabeth Hasselbeck opened the segment saying.
Ireland was contacted by a representative from “Fox and Friends” after Young Americans for Freedom reached out to the channel.
Ireland said he stands by what he said, but certain members of RHA said they have taken issue with his statements.
“The decision was not about whether Chick-fil-A should remain on campus as a whole, but rather about if RPS specifically should open negotiations to keep the vendor located in the Wells Library cafeteria,” RHA President Stephanie Corona said.
Furthermore, a new Chick-fil-A location is set to appear in the Indiana Memorial Union.
Though Ireland said he knows that RHA voted not to exclude Chick-fil-A from campus as a whole, but to exclude Chick-fil-A from the library, he said he believes that is not the primary story.
“I think the primary story isn’t whether Chick-fil-A will be here or not, but the fact that students voted specifically because of their political and ideological beliefs to remove that specific Chick-fil-A,” Ireland said.
Members of RHA disagree with Ireland.
“The main issue I have, and I think other members of RHA have, with the interview and what was said, is that the political issues were presented as the sole and only reason for the objection,” said Bronson Bast, RHA director of sustainability.
Ireland refutes that notion.
“I think that there were some folks that voiced economic concerns, but that’s not what the discussion was focused around,” Ireland said. “It was clarified to us multiple times in the conversation that night that we were very specifically looking at the political and social implications of a continued relation with Chick-fil-A.”
In the past few years, Chick-fil-A has come under fire for its stances on certain political issues.
But it wasn’t the only issue RHA discussed before the vote.
Members of RHA also objected on account that Chick-fil-A is closed Sundays and lacks options for vegetarians.
Sodexo, the company that currently manages the dining locations situated in the library and the IMU, will no longer manage the dining locations in the library, Patrick Connor, Residential Programs and ?Services executive director, said during the latest RHA meeting.
Instead, those dining locations currently situated in the library will be managed by RPS and added to the list of dining locations accessible through meal points, Connor said.
Coincidentally, the contract with Chick-fil-A is up for renewal and negotiation, Corona said.
RHA routinely reviews contracts with food vendors when they are up for renewal and negotiation.
Though a new Chick-fil-A location is set to appear in the IMU next academic year, the new location will continue to be managed by Sodexo.
Therefore, it will not be added to the list of dining locations accessible through meal points, Connor said.
Had the contract been renewed and the Chick-fil-A location remain in the library, the location would have been managed by RPS.
The Chick-fil-A would have been added to the list of dining locations accessible through meal points for students and faculty, Connor said.
In a vote, RHA decided not to renew Chick-fil-A’s contract, so the location will not remain in the library.
Andrew Guenther, RHA director of social advocacy and IDS columnist, disagrees with Ireland’s comments.
He thinks certain students should rethink how they portray RPS and IU on a national stage.
“(People) portraying RPS and IU as intolerant, as not fair to people of differing values and as a not all-around a great place to be, are people who really need to reconsider whether or not they want to be leaders in the IU community,” he said. “And whether or not they really value the IU community as a whole.”
