Radio host Mike Opelka, who ignited Goya’s “buy-cott” movement, told “Fox & Friends” on Tuesday that he is “trying to fight anger with love.”
On Friday, Opelka, a self-styled “conservative” radio presenter, tweeted: “My brother came up with a fabulous idea and I encourage everyone to join me in buying Goya Foods products worth $ 10 and donating them to your local food bank. ”
“Let’s push a buy-cott, not a boycott,” he continued. “We are going to show people #Goyaway what compassion can do.”
Opelka’s tweet received over 27,000 likes and 12,000 retweets.
“It looks like love is winning and that’s really what it’s all about, taking something negative and turning it into something positive that works for Goya employees and people who need food right now,” Opelka said Tuesday.
The idea of a “buy-cott” was in response to a backlash by Goya CEO Robert Unanue’s praise of President Trump at a White House event last week.
Many people, including progressive representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, DN.Y., expressed their discontent with Unanue and called for a boycott after he spoke at a Hispanic Prosperity Initiative at the White House on Thursday and said that the Americans were “truly blessed “for having Trump as leader. Opelka turned the narrative and asked for a “buy-cott” from Goya Foods.
“This is an ‘offensive’ group, we call them,” Opelka said Tuesday. “They are a group of people who get up every morning angry that Donald Trump is their president and are looking for a reason why they don’t like it even more.”
Opelka noted that his tweet “appears to have released several thousand responses from people who are emptying shelves and hopefully filling food banks.”
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Unanue, head of the New Jersey-based company, said Friday that the boycott is “a reflection of a division that exists in our country today” that is “killing our nation.”
“We are with the president. We are with this country: right, left, center, up and down, “Unanue told Fox Business’s” Varney & Co. ”
Unanue called the backlash over his comments “speech oppression.”
“In 2012, eight years ago, Michelle Obama called me … who wanted to reach out to the African American community, the Hispanic community to eat more nutritionally,” she said Friday. Unanue went on to say that he went to the White House and introduced President Obama during an event for Hispanic Heritage Month.
“And then you can speak well or praise a president, but … when I was called to join this commission to assist in economic educational prosperity and you make a positive comment, suddenly that is not acceptable.”
He went on to say that “he is not apologizing for saying” what he said on Thursday.
“If the President of the United States calls him, he will say, ‘No, I’m sorry, I’m busy, no, thanks.’ I didn’t say that to the Obamas, nor did I tell President Trump, “Unanue said.
Host Steve Doocy asked Opelka if this is “another example of the cancellation culture that comes after someone who doesn’t like it.”
“That is exactly what it is,” Opelka said in response. “What is happening here is that the ‘criminals’, as we call them, are trying to make sure that only their voice is heard and, if you disagree with them, they want it to shut down.”
He called Unanue “a brave man” and said that he supports “this CEO” and that he “will support any company or person who says that freedom of expression means speech that we do not disagree with and that we do disagree with. ”
“Everything has to be heard so brave for that gentleman,” he continued.
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The controversy has inspired some Goya Foods fans to give back. Virginia resident Casey Harper started a GoFundMe page on Saturday to buy Goya products to donate to food pantries. The page is already more than 16 times its goal of $ 10,000.
Fox Business’s Evie Fordham contributed to this report.
