Anti-immigration group riled by Yosemite resort's cancellation of conference

Tenaya Lodge is just outside the Yosemite National Park boundary near Wawona. (John Flinn/The Chronicle) Tenaya Lodge is just outside the Yosemite National Park boundary near Wawona. (John Flinn/The Chronicle) Image 1 of / 39 Caption Close Anti-immigration group riled by Yosemite resort's cancellation of conference 1 / 39 Back to Gallery

An anti-immigration organization and online publication called VDare is decrying a private Yosemite resort after its cancellation of a conference the website was hoping to hold there in March.

The resort in question, Tenaya Lodge (located just outside Yosemite National Park), had agreed to hold a conference for VDare wherein the group would give a platform to men and women with prominent anti-immigrant and white nationalist views. Those scheduled to speak included Jared Taylor, founder of the white supremacist publication "American Renaissance," and former U.S. Congressman and current Breitbart contributor Tom Tancredo, who has called multiculturalism a "mutating virus."

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which wrote a post criticizing the conference, considers VDare a white nationalist extremist group, saying it "regularly publishes articles by prominent white nationalists, race scientists and anti-Semites."

When another article about the conference by liberal research center Media Matters caught the attention of Tenaya Lodge's parent company, Delaware North, the resort moved to cancel the conference. Delaware North tells SFGATE that the hotel regrets the "mistake" of booking them.

"At the time of booking we did not realize this group has values that are in conflict with our embracement of diversity among our employees and guests, including people of different cultures, lifestyles, creeds, nationalities, races and ages," said Glen White, senior manager for Delaware North, in a statement. "We are also concerned that providing meeting space and rooms to this group could be disruptive to our other guests' enjoyment of Tenaya Lodge and the services we provide to those guests."

VDare, however, doesn't view the cancellation as an error, writing on their own site that organizer Lydia Brimelow and her planner were "transparent with Tenaya from the beginning."

"VDARE.com, we informed them, was a politically-oriented site that leaned controversial," Lydia Brimelow wrote. "There would be protestors. We would have security concerns. They should look us up. We repeatedly mentioned that we selected them because of their position on government property and their responsibility thereby to honor freedom of speech and assembly. Tenaya did not disabuse us of this false understanding."

Nevertheless, Tenaya canceled the booking, saying they "want to assure our employees and guests that in no way does Tenaya Lodge endorse this group."

Update, January 31: In response to the cancellation, VDare's Peter Brimelow has issued a statement.

"What Tenaya did was illegal, because we had a signed contract. Additionally, its representations to our Project Manager that it was governed by federal law i.e. the First Amendment were fraudulent. Tenaya probably thinks it can outlawyer us. We'll see. We will organize another conference, although we don't have the resources to do it this spring."