I’ve Hated Goya Foods for Years. Now, I Have a Reason To
The food company received backlash from its Hispanic customer base after publicly praising Trump.
In a move that triggered a massive boycott, Robert Unanue, the CEO of Goya Foods, made comments at a White House event Thursday in support of President Donald Trump, saying “We are all truly blessed, at the same time, to have a leader like President Trump who is a builder.”
Goya Foods, which specializes in ingredients like adobo, canned beans and pre-made mole sauces, is often considered a staple in many Latino dishes. But with Unanue’s outward support of Trump, Goya Foods has positioned itself as a politically and racially charged entity — a white company taking Latino money with a blatant disregard for how those Latino lives have been affected by the Trump regime.
Following Unanue’s comments, the hashtags #GoyaBoycott and #Goyaway began trending on major social media outlets, with big names in politics, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez suggesting she would boycott the brand, tweeting “Oh look, it’s the sound of me Googling ‘how to make your own Adobo.’”
Unanue’s Trump support is not the only issue with the New Jersey-based company, though it is the nail in the coffin for many Goya customers. Goya has been widely accepted as a Latino authority in the food industry. In 2013, a Washington Post article on the brand’s successes described Goya as having a “level of trust among urban Hispanic communities” that had “landed [the brand] in nearly every corner bodega and medium-size independent grocery store.” Now, in 2020, it’s time to reevaluate the business that allegedly “brought ethnic food to white America.” The white, Spanish-owned Goya Foods has profited off Latinidad since its inception, claiming its Hispanic roots for marketing when convenient. But despite Goya branding itself as the biggest Hispanic-owned food company in the United States, and “the premier source for authentic Latino cuisine,” the CEO is not actually Latino (Unanue is the grandson of Goya founder Don Prudencio Unanue and his wife Carolina, who were Spanish immigrants). Goya’s pride in “Latin-Inspired” food is nothing more than white-washing and appropriation of cultural cuisines by a white-owned company.
Though most popular among the Puerto Rican community, Goya Foods also sells products specifically catered to Mexican cuisine, like caldo de pollo chicken bouillon, pasilla chiles and tortillas. Unanue’s support of Trump, who has been known for being outwardly anti-Mexican, shows that Goya Foods does not care about their Latino customer-base. The header on the Goya website reads: “the Goya story is as much about the importance of family as it is about achieving the American dream.” Unanue’s support of Trump is a slap in the face for any Latino immigrant who has come to the United States in search of that dream. Trump has not only been historically anti-Mexican, calling Mexican immigrants rapists and claiming that they bring nothing but crime and drugs to the United States, but has also been blatantly anti-immigration. Locking children in cages and separating them from their parents at the border is antithetical to the very idea of the American Dream, and Goya Foods should know better than to support someone who goes against their most widely advertised company values.
The fact that Robert Unanue has been unapologetic since the backlash, citing the boycott as a “suppression of speech” is all the more reason for Latinos to look to other food retailers for their cultural cuisines. Latinidad is tied together by our food cultures and traditions. There is no room for anti-Latino politics or sentiment in our food. Unanue proclaiming Trump as “a builder” is a direct attack on the Mexican and Latino communities. The only “building” Trump has done for Mexican people is to build a 16-mile hunk of wall at the Mexican border and to build metal cages to keep migrant children in.
My family has hated Goya Foods products for years. Their canned beans are mushy and their Mexican food items are only a shadow of Mexico’s rich culinary traditions. Now that Unanue has made his political views known, it is clear that Goya’s history of questionable authenticity is rooted in a corporate culture that takes advantage of Latino cuisine for its own financial gain.
