Starbucks provided coffee to first responders at the RNC but was not an event sponsor

The Republican National Convention’s corporate sponsors included the American Petroleum Institute, American Beverage Association and General Motors Co. But some social media posts said Starbucks, the world’s largest coffeehouse chain, decided to join the party. 

"Starbucks joins the Heritage Foundation as the official sponsor of the RNC as they roll out Project 2025," a July 17 Facebook post read. "You know what to do."

(Screenshot of Facebook post)

This post, and others like it, were flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.) We also saw this claim on X. 

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stated on October 27, 2024 in an Instagram post

Vice Presidential nominee Tim Walz “says that if Democrats win they’ll make (U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) speaker of the house.”

The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, was an RNC sponsor and the architect of Project 2025, a widely discussed 900-page manual containing recommendations for the next conservative U.S. presidential administration.

But the post is wrong about Starbucks Corp. The company did not provide financial sponsorship to the RNC. It partnered with the Milwaukee 2024 Host Committee, a nonpartisan, nonprofit group that worked with the city of Milwaukee and the Republican National Committee to ensure the event ran smoothly. 

Confusion over the company’s role at the RNC arose after the Milwaukee Host Committee posted a picture on its homepage thanking its partners, which included Starbucks. 

Jaci Anderson, a Starbucks spokesperson, told The Associated Press that the company worked with the host committee to give coffee to the RNC’s first responders. Anderson also said that Starbucks will provide the same support to the Chicago 2024 Host Committee for the Democratic National Convention, which begins Aug. 19. 

We rate the claim that Starbucks was an "official sponsor of the RNC" False.