Salon owner slammed by Pelosi officially closes down her business, is 'afraid' to return to San Francisco



Erica Kious, the owner of the San Francisco salon visited by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) last week in violation of city health guidelines, has announced that she is officially going out of business.

What are the details?

Kious told Fox News host Tucker Carlson that the controversy surrounding Pelosi's visit on Aug. 31 has effectively destroyed her business in the city.

"I am actually done in San Francisco and closing my doors, unfortunately," the single mother of two said during an interview Wednesday.

Kious claimed that after exposing Pelosi by releasing surveillance footage of the lawmaker visiting the salon and waltzing through the store mask-less, she was hit with an onslaught of negative reviews and threatening messages.

"I started to just get a ton of phone calls, text messages, emails, all my Yelp reviews ... saying that they hope I go under and that I fail," she claimed. "So just a lot of negativity towards my business."

Last week, Kious even revealed to Carlson that she had received "death threats" as result of the incident.

On Wednesday, Kious said that she is "actually afraid to go back" to the city where she has lived and worked for more than a decade.

"It's a little scary and sad," she added. "I do have a lot of positive calls and text messages from clients. But other than that, nothing but negativity."

What's the background?

Pelosi was reportedly serviced by an an independent stylist who rents space at Kious' salon and later claimed she was led to believe that one-on-one appointments were permissible.

That, of course, was not the case under San Francisco rules which, at that time, barred personal service providers from performing any services indoors and/or which required a mask to be worn.

Pelosi should have known that, yet after the footage was released, she responded by claiming she was the victim of a "setup" and that she was the one who was owed "an apology."

"I take responsibility for trusting the word of the neighborhood salon that I've been to over the years many times," Pelosi said. "And that when they said 'We're able to accommodate people one person at a time' and that we can set up that time, I trusted that. As it turns out, it was a setup, so I take responsibility for falling for a setup."

Kious has vehemently denied that she set a trap for the speaker and has called that allegation "absolutely false."

Anything else?

After the incident a GoFundMe page was created in effort to raise funds for Kious to "pay off any debts from the business that she is forced to shut down [and] expenses to relocate and reopen in a new location."

So far, more than $336,000 has been raised.

Owner of salon ​where Pelosi visited says she has received death threats, will be forced to move since exposing the speaker



The owner of a San Francisco hair salon, which was visited Monday by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) in violation of multiple city guidelines, said she has received "death threats" and will likely be forced to move her business from the city she has serviced for more than a decade.

"Since this has happened, I have received nothing but hate — text messages, death threats [saying that] they're going to burn my hair salon down," eSalon owner Erica Kious told Fox News host Tucker Carlson Wednesday night.

"My Yelp page is just unbelievable with bad reviews. It's just sad that my community is pulling this ... saying that I threw her under the bus when I didn't," Kious said. "So that's hurtful, but yeah, I think I'm pretty much done now."

During the interview, Kious, a single mother of two, also fired back at Pelosi, calling the lawmaker's claims that she was "set up" by the salon as "absolutely false."

Pelosi lashed out at Kious Wednesday after Kious released footage of the speaker getting her hair done in the salon shuttered by the coronavirus restrictions. In the video, Pelosi can be seen walking through the salon without wearing a mask.

"There was no way I could've set that up," Kious fired back during the Fox News interview. "I've had a camera system in there for five years. I mean, I didn't go in there and turn cameras on as soon as she walked in and set her up. So that is absolutely false."

Salon owner joins Tucker, pushes back on Pelosi's claim she was 'set-up' youtu.be

Pelosi was reportedly serviced by an independent stylist who rents space in Kious' salon. The speaker later claimed she was led to believe that one-on-one indoor appointments were permitted by the salon.

But that is simply not the case under San Francisco guidelines, which still do not permit personal service providers such as hair salons to accommodate appointments and only permitted outdoor appointments on Tuesday.

As for Pelosi's unmasked face, the guidelines also state that "personal service providers may not perform any services that requires their customer to remove their face covering."

So, the fact of the matter is, Pelosi was either unaware of the rules or indifferent toward following them, and thus responsible for her own actions. Though not responsible for instituting these specific city policies, Pelosi's case is not helped by the fact that she has been supportive of lockdown measures, in general.

Kious called Pelosi's hypocrisy "a slap in the face" on Tuesday and her blame-game retaliation "hurtful" on Wednesday.

In regard to Pelosi's one-on-one accommodation excuse, Kious said, "I heard that and I thought to myself, 'Well as a hairstylist, I see clients one-on-one. So, that would mean that I would be open, right?'"

"This isn't even political," she added. "[Pelosi's] been coming in there ... it's the fact that she actually came in, didn't have a mask on, and I just thought about my staff and people not being able to work and make money and provide for their families, and if she is in there comfortably without a mask and feeling safe, then why are we shut down? Why am I not able to have clients come in?"