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PALO ALTO – Authorities are looking for a woman who caused a national outcry – and received death threats – earlier this month after publicly berating a 74-year-old man for wearing a Make America Great Again baseball cap in a coffee from Palo Alto.
Rebecca Parker Mankey was reported missing Friday morning when she did not return home to Palo Alto after visiting a friend in Lake County, Sgt. Aaron Clark of the Lake County Sheriff's Office.
Clark said the investigators thought that Mankey had left the grid to avoid the avalanche of negative attention that she had received.
"We have nothing that lets us think that she is at risk," Clark said in a telephone interview Friday night. "We determined with the people we talked to that she was wanting voluntarily."
Mobile phone operations placed Mankey in the Aberdeen area of Washington State around 9 am Friday.
On April 1, Mankey reprimanded the man at California Avenue Starbucks for wearing a red MAGA cap made famous by President Donald Trump and then posted on his Facebook page about the meeting.
"He will never forget me and will seriously think about wearing this hat in my city," she wrote.
This article sparked a firestorm in social media and a national debate over whether Mankey's actions reflected the country's political division or whether they represented banned extremism.
Mankey received death threats and was forced to resign from Gryphon Stringed Instruments, a company that sells, rents and repairs used and old musical instruments. She has also stepped down from her position as Co-Chair, Leader, and Member of Bayshore's Progressive Democrats.
"Parker was firmly convinced that she wanted to use her privilege as a white woman to defend those who live in fear because of the hateful atmosphere created by Trump," the club wrote on her Facebook page.
"Unfortunately, the way she has chosen to stand up against a slogan that defends racism has led to an even stronger hateful reaction that has endangered her safety and that of her family."
Anyone with information about where they are can call Sgt. John Gregore of the Lake County Sheriff's Office at 707-263-2690.
Come back for updates.
Writer Maggie Angst contributed to this report.
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