El Coyote Restaurant Manager Resigns Amidst Prop. 8 Fallout

The Proposition 8 fallout continues: A beleaguered manager of El Coyote, a Los Angeles restaurant popular with gays and lesbians, has quit after she came under fire for donating $100 to support the proposition.

As of Saturday evening, Marjorie Christoffersen was no longer employed at El Coyote, Frontiers magazinereported Monday on its website. Bill Schoeppner, a fellow manager at El Coyote, told Frontiers that Christoffersen tendered her resignation that night. Christoffersen, described on the El Coyote website as the "matriarch" of the 77-year-old restaurant, will also be resigning from the restaurant's board of directors.

The trouble began last month when local bloggers uncovered Christoffersen's donation. Christoffersen is a Mormon. A November 12 press conference intended to defuse the anger of the restaurant's gay clientele backfired when Christoffersen refused to apologize for the donation and said she would not financially support efforts to repeal Proposition 8, which banned same-sex marriage in California. It's been reported that gay and lesbian business at the Mexican eatery has dropped precipitously since then.

“Everybody is kind of used to her walking around the restaurant with a water pitcher going from table to table to table,” Schoeppner told Frontiers about Christofferson. “I guess that part is no longer going to exist.”