WATCH: Barstool Sports Founder Raises Alarm On New York’s Small Business Lockdowns (VIDEO)
Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy posted a rant video about New York City’s newest ban on indoor dining.
Portnot shared, New York City just closed indoor dining. My hair is f***ing big. New York City just closed indoor dining. What do they think’s going to happen? What do they think’s going to happen to thousands of restaurants, the bars. They’re done! The bar and restaurant industry and small business have been squeezed and squeezed and squeezed. And they’ve tried everything. They’ve been as creative as possible. They got the outdoor dining structures they’ve got to build on their own dime. You have the glass in between the masks. You’ve had the six feet of separation, fewer tables. They’ve been as creative as you can be to save their livelihoods, to save what they spent decades of blood, sweat, and tears building. They’ve done whatever they scratched and clawed. And now a few politicians in New York seems like, ergh you’re done. We’re shutting it down, no indoor dining. How do you expect these people to survive? This country is never going to be the same. This is it. This already swath through New York City. See, look at the buildings, look at the restaurants, boards after boards up the boards ‘out of business’, ‘rent’ signs. This is because of the way the government has handled it. Be as creative as the restaurant industry and bar industry. They’re doing everything you can. There’s no creativity from the government!
Portnoy explicitly called the restaurant restrictions a scheme to steal people’s “right to earn a living”
An eater NY survey revealed that more than half of New York restaurants are in imminent danger of closing permanently
Portnoy continued, “What are people going to go out to dinner now in ice-cold temperatures? It’s insanity and this isn’t about Corona or how dangerous in the hospitals and rising. It’s not. Listen, the vaccine is right around the corner. If you’re health impaired, you’re afraid of it, you’re old. Don’t go out. Stay inside for three months. The vaccine is coming, but let people decide. I can’t believe in this country, what I consider the most basic right of them all, the right to earn a living, the right to earn a livelihood, is now being stolen! It is being stolen by a few politicians who believe they are smarter than me and you. They believe they have the right to tell me and you how to live our lives. Something you could never imagine. Basic freedoms, they are stealing. And I’m not over saying, they are stealing it. And they’re saying they’re protecting us. Let us protect ourselves. You’re not protecting a family that you just destroyed.”
Portnoy also shared, “These people aren’t getting their livelihoods back. As I’ve said a million times, if I start Barstool and I work my d**k to the bone for a decade and I got right to the point, of making it. And you pulled the plug without me having the chance, I would rather die. And I don’t even think people dine when they’re wearing masks. People are aware of Corona. They’re being careful. And the rules, like, I’m in Miami right now. They just said, oh, you got to shut it down at midnight now. That’s a huge blow for the nightlife industry if it’s late. I can drive twenty five minutes and go out the county next door. I can go to Tampa. That’s the thing is not even uniform. You can go to a different county. You can do whatever! Some politicians are like, oh, I’m smarter than that guy or I’m going to tell this person how to live. There’s no uniformity. And by the way, all you brilliant politicians say no indoor dining, no going, out curfews. If somebody wants to go out, where do you think they’re going? House parties. It doesn’t even make sense. You’re not even protecting the people. The people who’d be going to these restaurants are still going out. I promise you, all you’re doing is ruining thousands and thousands and thousands of lives.”
