Starbucks fires employee who reportedly wrote 'defund the police' message on beverage cups

Starbucks fired a Houston employee after they reportedly wrote "defund the police" on at least one customer's order.

What are the details?

According to a Tuesday Newsweek report, the customer — who, on Facebook, goes by the name "Raseac Eibbed," or what appears to be "Debbie Caesar" backward — shared an image of the cup's printed message, which said, "Defund the police."

The user captioned the photo,"My exhusband [sic] takes my children to the Starbucks on I-10 and Kirkwood before bringing them home. All 3 of their drinks have this printed on the label. I called and made the manager aware...as if she wasn't already. She acted like she couldn't careless [sic]. All of my LEO friends be careful when getting anything from there. Feel free to call and speak to the manager their phone number is 281-584-9063. This s*** has to stop. We can't even get a cup of coffee without worrying about being poisoned or worse. Wtf is wrong with America???"

At the time of this reporting, the Facebook user's post has received more than 3,000 shares.

Did Starbucks say anything about this incident?

In a statement addressing the issue, Starbucks said, "Every customer should feel welcome and treated with respect when they visit any of our stores — especially our first responder community and their families. We have reached out to the customer involved to apologize, and the partner (employee) involved has been separated from the company. Any behavior from our partners that doesn't aspire to be a positive experience is unacceptable."

What else?

Ray Hunt of the Houston Police Officer Union condemned the employee's actions in a statement to KRIV-TV.

"It wouldn't be the first time that an officer who's had something put in their drink at a restaurant or somewhere where someone disagreed with the police," he told KRIV. "I was very disgusted that someone will post this in the way it was printed on they're concerned us that maybe this was a policy for Starbucks."

This, indeed, isn't the first time Starbucks employees have been the center of anti-police controversy.

Earlier in September, Target fired a Starbucks employee who went viral for making a "Blue Lives Matter" drink that reportedly contained bleach, as well as a call for "more dead cops."

In July, a Starbucks employee was fired after they were caught bragging about spitting in police officers' beverages.