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Instacart joined the throng of brands competing for good will by incentivizing Americans to get the COVID-19 vaccine through its “Get Vaxxed For Snacks” sweepstakes. The grocery delivery company’s logo happens to be a carrot. In this case, the carrot they’re dangling is a $500 gift card to spend on summer treats “from ice cream and popsicles to salsa and guacamole and everything in between!”
The rules seemed simple enough. Enter the sweepstakes here and wait to see if you’re one of the 200 winners chosen on July 1. Only D.C. was shit out of snacks. At least at first. The dropdown menu on the registration page didn’t include the District of Columbia in its list of states, making it impossible for anyone with a District address to compete for munchies.
Twitter user @KevMinLaw let ’em hear it.
Dear @Instacart: It is great that you are partnering with the @WhiteHouse to get people #vaccinated, but your entry form leaves out #DC!
— KevMinLaw 💛 (@kevminlaw) June 18, 2021
More evidence @MayorBowser & @councilofdc that we need #statehood just to put us on par with everyone else. pic.twitter.com/K3SqtrJRwv
Then the jokester behind the D.C. Council’s Twitter account, Josh Gibson, piled on.
Hey @instacart, our neighbor @kevminlaw has a good point—the residents of the Nation’s Capital are not on your states list, not under “District of Columbia” or under “Washington, DC.”
— Council of DC (@councilofdc) June 18, 2021
We have a Senate #DCStatehood hearing on Tuesday. In a tiny way, this helps us make our case. https://t.co/sEdnpWGDff pic.twitter.com/sj8GJkwTfc
In came Gwen from Instacart with a solution: Use District of Columbia as the city, and Virginia as the state. That didn’t sit right with anyone.
Six hours later, the company, which came under fire for the way it treated its shoppers during the pandemic, made the District of Columbia a state.
Hey there! The District of Columbia was added, please see our updated form here: https://t.co/pVz5XPcncK – Link
— Instacart (@Instacart) June 18, 2021
Now it’s up to Congress to follow suit. A Senate committee hearing on D.C. statehood is scheduled for June 22. Here are 51 reasons to support it.
“It’s good to be back in the running for snacks, but what we really want to add to our shopping cart is “statehood, once and for all,” Gibson of the D.C. Council Twitter account tells City Paper. “Whoever delivers that—we’ll tip generously.”
City Paper tried to reach @kevminlaw to ask about their fearless activism but they did not respond. This story will be updated should they want to comment.