Austin Bingo Hall's Joke About Building Wall Falls Flat With Largely Hispanic Customer Base

SOUTH AUSTIN, TX — Bingo is easy. Comedy, on the other hand, is hard.

Officials at the American Bingo hall at 1919 E. Riverside Dr. in South Austin on Tuesday raised the ire of many in the Latino community after a Facebook post alerting to construction of a new wall at the parlor encasing the site's new non-smoking section. But instead of just alerting to the construction, the post drew parallels to the wall Donald Trump wants desperately to build along the U.S.-Mexico border to keep immigrants out.

"We built a wall and Mexico paid for it!" the social media announcement read. Come enjoy our new expanded non-smoking section at American Bingo!"

People — many of them Mexican American customers of the game room in a part of the city where there's a sizable Hispanic population — were not amused.

Given the outcry, officials at American Bingo late Tuesday took down the offending post with an apology, blaming the entire episode on a marketing mistake. "Today, a member of our marketing team made an inappropriate joke on a Facebook post that said Mexico paid for a new non-smoking wall in the bingo hall," officials acknowledged. "This does not at all reflect American Bingo or its charity partners and we sincerely apologize for this offensive and insensitive comment."

But by then, the damage was already done. Many expressed their outrage on social media, vowing never to play bingo at the place again.

"Feeling disappointed and disrespected from my favorite place I love to go and spend family time with my kids and a place to go for momy time," wrote Monica Ramirez. "WHY?!" Lala Paez also wrote to American Bingo officials via Facebook: "This is racism and 90 percent Mexicans do go there, we spend a lot of money there," she wrote. "Whether this is a joke or not, it's not right at all. I think it's time for me to take mine and my mom's business somewhere else. This is sad!"

Local public relations specialist and former Austin ISD board member Paul Saldaña shared the original post on the Hispanic Advocates Business Leaders of Austin (HABLA) social media page. "As Hispanic Latinos in Austin, nearly 40 percent of the city's population celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month @AmericanBingo in our city issues this racist commentary," he wrote. "There's still so much work to do!"

Patch tried contacting American Bingo officials with no success. After the whole debacle over the wall thing, officials at the bingo hall announced they would be closed as a result of plumbing issues. There was no joke here as an accompanying photo purported to illustrate the extent of the plumbing emergency, complete with safety cones.

>>> Image via Shutterstock