Goya Foods CEO Doubles Down On Trump Support As Boycott Grows

The CEO of Goya Foods doubled down on his support for President Donald Trump  following calls for a boycott against his company and added that the outrage at his praise for the president is sowing dangerous divisions.

“We are with the president. We’re with this country, you know, right, left, center, up and down,” CEO Robert Unanue said Friday on Fox Business Network .

Calls for a boycott against the New Jersey-based Goya Foods, which markets Latin American pantry staples, lit up after Unanue appeared with Trump in the White House Rose Garden Wednesday. Unanue heaped praise on the president after Trump — who has a long  history of racism toward Latinx people — announced a White House Hispanic prosperity initiative. 

“We’re all truly blessed at the same time to have a leader like President Trump, who is a builder,” Unanue said, comparing Trump to his Spanish immigrant grandfather.

Speaking on Fox Business Network’s “Varney & Co.” Friday, Unanue dismissed the calls for a boycott.

“It’s just a reflection, I believe, of the division that exists today in our country,” he said. 

He added: “Unfortunately, this great divide is killing our nation. We’re tearing down statues of Jesus Christ.”

That’s not true. One activist, who had already been largely shunned by other leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement, called for European depictions of Jesus to come down amid the anti-racism reckoning, but it has not happened. 

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Julián Castro, a former secretary of housing and urban development, were among those who vowed to boycott Goya after Unanue’s remarks Wednesday.

“Oh look, it’s the sound of me Googling ‘how to make your own Adobo,’” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted.

Castro said Unanue is praising a president who “maliciously attacks Latinos for political gain.”

Trump launched his first presidential campaign with hateful and incendiary comments about Mexicans and has spent much of his presidency vilifying Latinx people seeking safe refuge in the U.S.