An upstate New York transgender woman is suing Hooters for repeatedly refusing to hire her — while the restaurant claims she was booted for inappropriate behavior starting before she transitioned.
Brandy Livingston told NEWS 10 that she applied three times to work as a tight-topped staffer at the chain’s diner in Colonie — despite alleging that she was harassed by staff there as a regular customer.
“They would use male pronouns — they would refer to me as ‘he,'” alleged Livingston, who only recently transitioned to female.
“I overheard one of the servers after I left the restroom talking to one of the managers and said, ‘Why are you allowing him in the women’s restroom?’ And the manager said, ‘Oh, I don’t like it any more than you do,” Livingston alleged.
Even so, Livingston says she applied three times to work there, complaining that she got rejected each time without a fair shake.
A hiring manager didn’t even care if she had suitable experience, she told News 10. “He said, ‘Oh, we don’t care about experience. We hire on the basis of personality. And there’s an image that needs to be met,'” she alleged.
Hooters, however, painted a vastly different picture — alleging that Livingston was asked to not return to the restaurant for alarming behavior starting before she transitioned.
The wannabe worker made multiple servers uncomfortable by proposing marriage and discussing masturbation — and even threatened to go to a gun range to practice for the next time she visited, Hooters told the outlet via lawyers.
Asked about the allegations, Livingston maintained that she “never said anything about” masturbation or marriage — and that the gun-range complaint was likely a misunderstanding.
“My mom would take me to the gun range and for clay pigeon shooting, trap. I feel like one of the servers might have overheard what me and my dad were talking about and misunderstood what we were talking about,” she told News 10. Local authorities did not have any reports of gun threats related to Hooters’ claims, the outlet reported.
https://nypost.com/2024/10/31/us-news/transgender-woman-sues-upstate-hooters-for-not-hiring-her/#
Livingston said she is “suing Hooters for sex-based discrimination, on the basis of accommodation and on the basis of employment.”
“What I really want is an apology. I’m never going to get that,” she said of her one-time favorite restaurant.
She filed a claim with the New York State Division of Human Rights, which says it found sufficient evidence that her rights may have been violated under New York Executive Law 296.
A Human Rights hearing has been set for September next year. “It’s a very slow system,” the accuser’s mom, Adelle, told the outlet. “I think that’s why more people don’t stand up for their rights.”
The complaint sparked protests outside the restaurant, with a small group of people carrying colorful, homemade signs reading “sex-based discrimination is wrong” and “trans women are women.”
Hooters did not immediately return a request for comment from The Post on Thursday.
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