Conservative opinion journalist Michelle Malkin reports that she and her husband have been banned by Airbnb for a keynote speech that she gave to a white nationalist conference.
3/I've reached out to @airbnb asking what steps they took to obtain my full remarks at AmRen 2022 & how many other FAMILIES of #americafirst patriots like mine have been retaliated against & deemed dangerous individuals for peaceful, lawful free speech. NO RESPONSE. Screenshots: pic.twitter.com/8YNlFiTQfW
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) February 2, 2022
Here’s how she describes that talk that got her banned from Airbnb,
The speech delved into the K-20 metastasis of anti-white curriculum, the corporate media’s whitewashing of black-on-Asian attacks, and the long campaign to censor nationalist dissidents who put America first.
Michelle Malkkin is in an odd pickle here, as she seems to acknowledge. She argued that bakers of wedding cakes ought to be able to refuse service to same sex couples. She twists herself in knots trying to distinguish the two issues, ultimately saying “but fair housing law” should apply here (an unusual claim about viewpoint discrimination, and out of character for her to defend fair housing laws in any case).
6/ To the “what about gay wedding cakes now” retorters: desserts and public accommodations are apples and oranges. Not just about freedom to contract but equal right to accommodation. Either stand by fair housing law/jurisprudence or repeal it all. Pick.
— Michelle Malkin (@michellemalkin) February 2, 2022
She calls her Airbnb ban ‘de-platforming’ but it should be noted that there are several other sites through which she can still reserve homesharing stays. And she’s still permitted to stay in hotels.
Ms. Malkin says that she’s on a public crusade against Airbnb as part of her effort to counter the Anti-Defamantion League and protect the rights of speakers at white nationalist conferences. The conference she spoke at previously hosted David Duke by the way.
As a policy matter, I believe Airbnb ought to be free to ban white nationalists or others they disasgree with from their platform. However I’d prefer they simply give potential hosts a warning flag that this user is a white supremacist. Some hosts would refuse to rent to them, while others might insist they use only a rented unit’s back entrance.
Short sell $ABNB.
DISCLAIMER: NOT INVESTMENT ADVICE
Whew! We made it to the 2nd page of comments. Let me just put this here.
Airbnb has the absolute right to do this. In America. Which may not be a prosperous country for much longer but that is neither here nor there, anywho…..
Airbnb was absolutely stupid to do this and I hope their business fails. I would sooner stay at a Marriott hotel — on my own dime, on a Priceline rate, no elite perks, in a tiny room next to the train tracks, where the mattress is stained and housekeeping left for the day and the toilet overflows and the sink doesn’t drain — than even an Airbnb Luxe that somebody else is paying for.
Big Booty, so why do they call you Big Booty?
idk man why do you go by reno joe
AirBnb is a travel agent lodging booking company. It should only ban people who are a threat to (1) damage properties (2) fail to pay (3) engage in prohibited discrimination (4) use property for an illegal purpose. Period.
This BS about AirBnb being a private company and can make their own rules is nonsense. AirBnb is subject to all federal and state antidiscrimination laws including the California Unruh act which prohibits discrimination based on political views.
What’s next airlines that refuse to fly someone because they are wearing a Trump hat?
At some point the cancel culture needs to stop.
This is not an endorsement of Malkin or white supremacists. If you don’t want these people renting your place then simply dump airbnb, run an advert on google and screen people yourself.
@Boraxo — a private, American company is entitled to make their own rules in America so long as they comport with all federal and state (and municipal) laws you are correct but please read the laws you are citing because political viewpoint is not a protected class and it is completely, legally, acceptable to do what Airbnb did to Michelle Malkin.
The protected classes are:
Political viewpoint is not included
It is amazing how all of you perfect people on the left are always trying to cancel, ban, attack anyone who happens to have a different opinion than you do. This once (and I say once) great country is going down the drain due to the mentality of the “cancel culture crowd”. It was born/created out of different opinions/thoughts. I wish I could go through each and every one of your commenters’
life who has made a negative remark about this young lady’s life. I bet it wouldn’t be pretty.
@C E B – America is still a great country today. It is just not clear how much longer that will last. The cancel culture crowd is only one reason and might be a trivial reason. All empires fall, history teaches us that much. Another reason would be blatant overvaluation of companies like Airbnb.*
*This opinion is mine and does not reflect the opinion of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission.
No clue what the heck amren is, but I would be willing to bet Jussie Smollet remains free and unfettered regarding his Airbnb account.
Slow news day
I’m guessing all the people who are calling her a “white supremacist” don’t know that she is Asian. I’m left-leaning but this cancel culture is too much.
“Let the market decide.” The free market has spoken.
@C E B like the Republicans ‘cancelling’ LIz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for investigating an attack on the Capitol that wounded 140 officers?
@Big Booty – Ok, that seems like definition of white nationalism which would be similar to my understanding of it. Therefore, it wouldn’t make sense to invite Malkin as a speaker since she is an American-Filipino. She’s by definition what white nationalists don’t want – unless someone thinks she’s calling for all American-Filipino to leave the US and go back to the Philippines, but that seems absurd and wasn’t at all what her talk was about.
@Jackson W
My family escaped oppression for religious freedom on the actual Mayflower and my family has fought for this country since that time. We hide escaped slaves during the civil war and while I am WASP and Italian Catholic, I am not racist or against any religion. I am a conservative, so was Lincoln and it was the GOP, not the democrats who started to break down barriers (BTW, the Southern Democrats were the first to invoke voting restrictions. . . open a history book and read it).
I support freedom, not free reign, not bullying, not disrespectful behavior. There is a difference but many have forgotten how to behave, how to act when they don’t agree with other. Trump and his lowlifes are how other countries picture the United States, and now they have been exposed and it’s time to show them HOW to be a US citizen.
@ceb, like those of you on the right who attacked the Capitol on Jan 6?
So my takeaway is if you don’t want to be banned from Airbnb, don’t be a piece of human garbage like Michelle Malkin.
Well, it’s pretty easy to not be like her. You have to try really damn hard to be as awful of a person as she is.
@Big Booty
Might want to read the article lined in her article. Written by a fairly distinguished Law prof form UCLA, recounting the various anti-discriminatory statues around the country, include Unruh
Excerpt:
The California public accommodation statute doesn’t specifically list political affiliation as a forbidden basis for discriminating in public accommodations or housing, but the California Supreme Court has read it as generally barring a wide range of “arbitrary discrimination,” including—though in dictum—political affiliation discrimination:
Under the [Unruh Act], an individual who has [not violated any reasonable rules regulating the conduct of patrons or tenants] cannot be excluded solely because he falls within a class of persons whom the owner believes is more likely to engage in misconduct than some other group. Whether the exclusionary policy rests on the alleged undesirable propensities of those of a particular race, nationality, occupation, political affiliation, or age, in this context the Unruh Act protects individuals from such arbitrary discrimination.[14]
An earlier decision likewise stated that, under the Unruh Act, a shopping center couldn’t exclude prospective customers “who wear long hair or unconventional dress, who are black, who are members of the John Birch Society, or who belong to the American Civil Liberties Union.”[15]
.
So there’s the LETTER of the law, in which case, you would be correct, and there there is how the courts are interpreting it. ‘Nother thing…
.
Link: https://reason.com/volokh/2021/10/18/bans-on-political-discrimination-in-places-of-public-accommodation-and-housing/
The common law duty of innkeepers to provide lodging is centuries older than the Constitution or any civil right statues.
Those who hold themselves out as providing lodging to the travelling public have established duties toward prospective guests.
Google “Innkeeper’s Right to Exclude or Eject Guests, Fordham Law Review 1938” for a good overview of the common law long before any civil right statutes.
The article has a very good section on whether innkeepers can exclude prospective guests on the basis of bad character or reputation in the absence of a probability that the prospective guest will damage or cause a disturbance at the place of lodging. I recommend reading that section, which concludes in part:
“True, an innkeeper may keep out one who would bring discomfort to his guests. But the presence of a person, known to be privately immoral, yet acting decorously, can disturb only the fastidious, and the necessities of the traveling public must be protected before these nice sensibilities.’ It is submitted that the presence of a bad character brings no direct physical discomfort, but offends only the moral sense. An advocate of euthanasia would hardly be less offensive, yet who would deny his right to
accommodation at a hotel? Private virtue cannot be made a condition precedent to admission. But the inveterate thief, who probably will purloin the goods of host and fellow guests can rightfully be denied admission; similarly, a person of such immoral nature that misconduct in the hotel is reasonably expected, cannot complain if refused accommodation. Obviously, one who intends objectionable conduct forfeits his right to enter”
To those who say that “political affiliation” is not a protected class under any civil rights statutes, the answer is: doesn’t matter, doesn’t have to be.
@SeanNY2 People renting out their homes aren’t innkeepers.
AmRen are normal conservatives honest about race….which places like National Review once acknowledged before they became neocon toilet paper rags. Typical hypocrisy and lies. Call the Filipino American a white supremacist.
“Michelle Malkin reports that she and her husband have been banned by Airbnb for a keynote speech that she gave to a white nationalist conference”
UTTERLY FALSE !
MM did not say she gave a speech to “a white nationalist conference” (sic).
Yes, I know the far left reflexively calls anyone to the right of Chaiman Mao a white nationalist, but Michelle absolutely did NOT call the AMREN conference White Nationalist, so why in the world are YOU lying that she called them that?
I do understand the concept of ‘clic bait’ titles, but this is so far over the line as to be totally disgusting !
bhcompy says: @SeanNY2 People renting out their homes aren’t innkeepers.
bhcompany: You can also say that a hotel is not an inn. Or maybe a hostel is not an inn. The question is not common parlance, but whether under the law management of a lodging establishment owes the duties of an innkeeper. In Michigan, for example, lawyers think they do. The Virginia Supreme Court has ruled that they don’t if they rent out the entire house, but they probably do if they just rent one or more rooms.
Malkin, for example, could try to rent a single room on AirBnb in Virginia and some would say she’d have a very good case under Haynes-Garrett v. Dunn, 818 S.E.2d 798 (Va. 2018).
Airbnb is not an innkeeper. It is a website that connects travelers to people who are selling, lawfully or not, space that may not even be a private accommodation. As a lawyer I would not waste my time arguing this case.
Those entities selling accommodations, whether innkeepers or not, have not expressly banned Michelle Malkin. This further weakens any legal grounds.
David Duke was the Imperial Wizard, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan between 1974-1981. He gave a speech at University of the Pacific while I was in college during that time. It was informative and solidified my negative feelings about the KKK. Free speech is so much better than cancel culture. Rather than live questioning, Duke asked us to write questions down and pass them to the front. The first two: “Do you like soul food?” and, “Where do you get your sheets cleaned?” We should trust people to think for themselves rather than censoring opposing points of view.
The wedding cake analogy misses the mark so badly, it’s a straw man argument. The same-sex couple wanted a wedding cake that featured a groom and a groom or bride and a bride. In other words, they wanted her to perform work that went against her religious beliefs. Airbnb is banning Malkin due to her political beliefs, not because she is asking them to do something outside of what they normally do. It’s not like she’s asking them to put out Trump flags on the building for her visit. By the way, what Airbnb is doing is illegal. If she sues, she will win.