Thomas Keller – the celebrity chef and restaurateur behind New York restaurants Per Se, Bouchon Bakery and the now-closed TAK Room – appears to have deleted his Twitter account this week after receive criticism for posting a memorabilia of Sheldon Adelson, a casino mogul and big Tory donor who is dead January 11.

“Thank you for your support of The Venetian, Bouchon Las Vegas and more. We will miss you, ”Keller wrote in the tweet, who along with his Twitter account has since been deleted. Commentators on the social media platform were quick to criticize Keller for supporting Adelson, a megadonator of right-wing causes and the founder of the world’s largest gaming company, Las Vegas Sands Corporation.

Keller’s recollection of Adelson isn’t the first time his social media posts have been seen as empathizing with controversial conservative figures. In April, President Donald Trump appointed Keller to the White House’s so-called Great American Economic Revival Industry Group, a all male panel which included restaurateurs Wolfgang Puck, Jean-Georges Vongerichten and Daniel Boulud, as well as representatives from companies like Chick-fil-A, Subway and Pepsi.

Seemingly oblivious that the board could cause a backlash on social media, Keller tweeted on April 15, 2020 that he was “honored” to be named to the group and was “proud to work together towards a strategy where the safety of people is safe. Americans are at the forefront of mind in conjunction towards economic revitalization. The rest, as they say, is the story.

About two weeks after this tweet, his three Michelin star restaurant, the French Laundry, received two unusually large loans through the Paycheck Protection Program in April 2020, for a total of $ 2.4 million. The loans, which were roughly 17 times more than what the average Bay Area restaurant was receiving, were approved at a time when other restaurateurs across the country were said that program funding was exhausted.

It is not clear at this time whether Keller deleted his Twitter account in response to the backlash which followed his tweet on Adelson, however, the restaurateur still appears to be active on Instagram, after posting a promotion for his Finesse retail store, The Store on January 13. Eater has contacted the Thomas Keller restaurant group on several occasions to find out more. information.

Adelson’s massive net worth – approximately $ 35 billion, according to Forbes – has been used to support conservative politicians in the United States and Israel, the birthplace of his wife, Dr. Miriam Adelson. Adelson and his wife donated $ 93 million to the Republican presidential campaign in 2012, $ 82.5 million to Republican groups in 2016, and $ 350 million to Republican candidates in 2018 and 2020. In 2016 and 2020, the couple were the biggest donors to the Trump campaign. .

Adelson’s global chain of casinos and hotels has attracted big names in the restaurant business, including David Chang, Wolfgang Puck and Keller, which operates a Bistro stopper at Adelson’s Venetian-themed Las Vegas Venetian Resort.