Sesame Place hit with $25 million racial discrimintation lawsuit
A Baltimore family has filed a $25 million lawsuit against Sesame Place over allegations of racial discrimination.
The class action civil rights lawsuit alleges that multiple costumed members of staff at the Sesame Street themed amusement park ignored a 5-year-old Black girl during a meet-and-greet in June.
According to legal documents obtained by EW, the filing claims that four employees dressed as Sesame Street characters Elmo, Ernie, Telly Monster, and Abby Cadabby refused to engage with Quinton Burns, his daughter Kennedi Burns and other Black guests during the June 18 event. The Burns family maintains the employees were "ignoring them and all other Black guests in attendance."
Katherine Frey/The Washington Post via Getty Images Sesame Place in Langhorne, Pa.
The motion was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania against the owners of Sesame Place, SeaWorld Parks for "pervasive and appalling race discrimination."
In a press conference on Wednesday, Malcolm Ruff, an attorney for the family, urged SeaWorld for transparency and to indemnify the Burns family over the alleged racial discrimination.
"We stand before you here today simply trying to fight and protect little Black children and their fundamental civil rights," Ruff said.
In a statement, Sesame Place says they will review the lawsuit and "are committed to deliver an inclusive, equitable and entertaining experience for all our guests."
The news comes after a video taken at Sesame Place in Langhorne, Pa. this month spread across social media and quickly went viral. The footage appeared to show an employee dressed as the character of Rosita seemingly avoiding two Black children during a parade at the park.
The family subsequently hired a legal team and called for the unnamed actor to be terminated from the park.
Representatives for Sesame Place have released multiple statements since the widely publicized incident and have vowed to "conduct training for our employees so they better understand, recognize, and deliver an inclusive, equitable, and entertaining experience to our guests."
The park also stated that the actor behind Rosita maintains the "no" hand gesture seen in the video "was not directed to any specific person, rather it was a response to multiple requests from someone in the crowd who asked Rosita to hold their child for a photo which is not permitted."
The story has gained the attention of stars like Kelly Rowland and Whoopi Goldberg, who addressed the matter on The View.
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