A brief Facebook post appeared innocuous.
The Grapevine Police Department thanked a local company for gifting its staff a pizza party, adding that it was “blessed to have their support and encouragement.”
But the gift, made by the Christian conservative Patriot Mobile cellphone company, caused an outcry on social media, where people urged the department to return it.
On Saturday, Grapevine police said it would not accept the gift certificate to Cane Rosso and would instead donate it to an organization in need. The amount of the certificate was not immediately clear.
“We do not question a donor’s beliefs, we simply express our gratitude,” the department wrote in a follow-up post. “In this case, however, the donation brought out deep emotion.”
Patriot Mobile — which describes itself as “America’s only Christian conservative wireless provider” — has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to promote like-minded candidates in recent Tarrant County suburban school board races.
Last spring, the company’s political action committee sent thousands of political mailers accusing sitting school board members of endangering students with critical race theory and other “woke” ideas regarding gender and race.
All 11 candidates backed by Patriot Mobile won their races across four school districts: Grapevine-Colleyville, Southlake, Keller and Mansfield.
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