A day after a Hampton Inn in the Minneapolis suburb of Lakeville, Minn., was accused of denying service to immigration agents, the Hilton hotel company scrubbed the franchise location from its system, and Hilton’s website was no longer displaying the hotel as a booking option.
Other travel sites, including Expedia and Booking.com, had also stopped offering reservations at the Hampton Inn Lakeville Minneapolis.
Hilton, which owns the Hampton Inn brand, said in a statement posted on X on Tuesday that it took the action after a conservative influencer posing as a Department of Homeland Security employee posted a video on X in which he tried to book several rooms late Monday night and was turned away.
The video came hours after Homeland Security criticized the hotel company on social media, accusing it of conducting a “coordinated campaign” to refuse service to its law enforcement officers. That post prompted Hilton and Everpeak Hospitality, which owns the Hampton Inn in Lakeville, to issue public apologies affirming that they welcomed all guests and government agencies.
In the video, an employee of the Hampton Inn, who appeared unaware that he was being filmed, told the influencer that the policy to turn away immigration agents remained in place, contradicting the companies’ earlier statements.
Management of the Lakeville Hampton Inn and Everpeak representatives could not immediately be reached for comment.
Hilton, a global hospitality company, encompasses more than 25 hotel brands. The Lakeville hotel was one of Hilton’s many franchise locations that are independently owned and operated. A Hilton spokesperson did not respond to a question about whether the Lakeville location’s franchise agreement had been terminated.
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Christine Chung is a Times reporter covering airlines and consumer travel.
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