LAKE WORTH BEACH, Fla. — Less than 24 hours after a controversial sign was posted outside a longtime Lake Worth Beach bar, the general manager has taken it down.
"You know, that sign is meant to be humorous, and I thought it was just another humorous sign but apparently it struck a nerve," Harry's Banana Farm general manager Lou De Stout said.
The sign read "How do you miss a head that's that inflated?" in reference to former president Donald Trump and Saturday's assassination attempt.
De Stout called the sign free speech.
"To be honest with you, I (create) the sign and I try to make it timely, topical, humorous and do it [in] 10 words or less," DeStout said. "I go [with] whatever is the hot topic and as soon as that happened to Trump I knew that's all that everybody was going to be talking to for the next two weeks."
He said his sign was up for less than 24 hours, and the bar received multiple threats of violence and arson, telling him to shut the place down, and countless negative Yelp reviews, which he said shut down his business profile.
"After a while, I thought ... I can't have my staff being threatened for the things that I do, it's not fair to them," DeStout said. "Some of them are young girls. They have young kids, and it's a great staff here and I didn't want to put them in harm's way."
Located along U.S. Highway 1, Harry's Banana Farm was established in 1954 and has been known to have a variety of signage.
DeStout said last month he had a sign poking fun at President Joe Biden.
The bar has now replaced the controversial Trump sign with one that reads, "Yeah, for Trump, so happy for him, you crazy bastards happy."
"I like the signs that make people laugh, but I don't like the signs about our president," Rocco Talarico from Palm Beach Island said.
Talarico is a Trump supporter and said he saw the sign that was on display Monday.
"Every time I pass here I get knots in my stomach, it's disgusting what they put out all the time," Talarico said. "Every time that something happens, they put the sign out. I'm totally against it."
Trump
Trump said if he hadn't turned his head during his rally speech, he'd be dead
According to Talarico, the compromise would be to stop posting signs about, Biden, Trump and any other president.
"It is what it is. It's not condoning violence or anything like that, so to me it doesn't offend me," Harry's Banana Farm patron Christopher Westcott said.
He said the signage isn't deterring him from going to drink at the bar.
"I think some people take things too personally, freedom of speech is freedom of speech," Westcott said. "I don't agree with the politics of everyone here but so what? I'm not here to talk about politics."
PROTESTS ENSUE:
During our coverage, a group of about 10 Trump supporters showed up outside of Harry's Banana Farm on Tuesday, protesting the bar with their pro-Trump flags.
"As trump supporters, Americans we're not going to stand by that rhetoric," Jestin Nevarez said.
Nevarez said he's been to Harry's Banana Farm and said he knows its reputation for controversial signs.
"We don't want any violence any harm, I want to talk civilly with people, but some people can't and it's tough," Nevarez said. "Maybe I got a little out of line as well, but that's the nature of the game."
Harry's patron Billy Hart said he's a regular and wanted to show his support for the bar.
"The sign was a little bit tasteless, but that's how Harry's is," Hart said. "Harry's always does that, they roast both sides, all forms of government every step of it, including council members locally."
Hart, a United States Marine and Iraq War veteran, said the bar should have the right to practice it's freedom of speech. "They can hold signs and have all sorts of signs and have all sorts of stuff with Biden locked in a trunk and it's fine, but all of the sudden a sign comes up and because he got wind in the ear, we have to cow toe to this?"
Trump supporters like Pam Fix said the Secret Service has been advised of the signs posted at Harry's.
"You cannot put messages up there like that because there are people that are mentally ill in this country that will take it literally like 'OK, let me go shoot the president,'" said Fix. "Places like this should be put out of business."
Westcott said that the bar does good for the community. Harry's Banana Farm has hosted toy drives and collected supplies for back-to-school over the years.
Last year, they also started a nonprofit called "Harry's Helping Hands of Lake Worth Beach" to support families in need.
"There's a lot of kids that would miss out at the end of the year, it amazes me how much it pulls in to donate to the kids," Westcott said. "Once you lose an establishment like this, it never returns. You could call it a hole, but it's not a hole in the wall. It's actually a decent place."
De Stout said the bar's doors are open for anyone who wants peaceful discourse.
