A video showing a McDonald’s customer in Savannah, Georgia, telling a young Latina to “speak English” has gone viral since it was first posted on Twitter last Saturday.
Cristina Riofrio, 19, called the man “a racist” after he lashed out at her for speaking Spanish with a friend.
“I know I am,” he responded.
In the video, the man, who is white, can be seen and heard saying that he has been living in the United States for years. At the same time, he suggested that Riofrio came to the country “on a f—— boat”.
Chatham County Sheriff John T. Wilcher confirmed Wednesday that the man was employed at the sheriff’s office and was terminated. Wilcher said he was not in the office and did not know the man’s exact position, but that he does not tolerate that type of behavior.
Riofrio, who is Ecuadorian, said she was at the McDonald’s with three friends when suddenly the guy next to her said to stop speaking Spanish.
She claimed the man invoked Trump’s name a few times but she only responded once he claimed her parents came to America and made it “a horrible place.”
“At first I was really surprised and shocked but then I realized these people, there’s a lot of people in this country and sadly us people that are foreigners that speak other languages, not only Latinas, others, have to sadly face this,” Riofrio said.
A McDonald’s employee asked the man to leave after the altercation got heated and others came to help her, Riofrio said.
Riofrio shared the viral video with a tweet saying, “In America, I can speak f—— Spanish if I want to.” The clip of the incident has been viewed more than 2 million times on Twitter as of Wednesday afternoon.
Her post has been retweeted 15,000 times and has received almost 47,000 likes and 940 replies from other users.
“When someone has the face to tell me to stop speaking my NATIVE language, and starts harassing me verbally, I WILL defend myself,” Riofrio tweeted in response to a Twitter user commenting on her post.
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Doha Madani contributed.
