Tweet with a location 
 
 You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| 
 
 (Left: Jacquelyn Martin/AP. Right: @nusr_ett/Twitter) 
 
 In the weird world of Internet stardom, a Turkish chef known for his distinctive method of salting his steaks briefly became a ridiculous meme. His name is Salt Bae, or, as GQ put it, “America’s newest celebrity chef.” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) apparently never saw the meme and is not one of Salt Bae’s 15.7 million followers on Instagram, where the chef posts photos of himself hanging out with the likes of Sean “Diddy” Combs, Drake and DJ Khaled. 
 
 But when it came to Salt Bae — real name Nusret Gokce — serving steak to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro at one of his restaurants, the time had come for Rubio to call out the chef. 
 
 On Monday, Rubio denounced Salt Bae for serving the Venezuelan president at his restaurant, Nusr-Et, in Istanbul. 
 
 “I don’t know who this weirdo #Saltbae is, but the guy he is so proud to host is not the President of #Venezuela,” Rubio wrote on Twitter. A few minutes later, he posted another tweet that included the address and phone number of Gokce’s restaurant in Miami, “in case anyone wanted to call.” 
 
 Rubio has been a vocal critic of Maduro, and earlier this year called out Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) for meeting with the socialist leader. In February, Rubio suggested that the Venezuelan military should remove Maduro from power. 
 
 I don’t know who this weirdo #Saltbae is, but the guy he is so proud to host is not the President of #Venezuela. He is actually the overweight dictator of a nation where 30% of the people eat only once a day & infants are suffering from malnutrition. https://t.co/sSNPK9cAAx — Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 18, 2018 
 
 This guy @nusr_ett who admires dictator @NicolasMaduro so much actually owns a steakhouse in, of all places, #Miami. It’s called NUSR-ET STEAKHOUSE MIAMI located at 999 Brickell Avenue, Miami, FL 33131 
 
 The phone number is 1 305 415 9990 in case anyone wanted to call. https://t.co/7CDkgHVZWh — Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 18, 2018 
 
 The Florida senator was responding to a video that appeared on Gokce’s Twitter and Instagram account on Monday, but was deleted shortly after Rubio drew attention to it. According to the Miami Herald, which downloaded a copy before it disappeared, the video shows Gokce preparing slabs of meat for Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and “sprinkling it with the flourish that earned him tacit Internet fame.” Maduro smoked a cigar. Later, Gokce gave Maduro a Salt Bae T-shirt. 
 
 After the video was posted, numerous commenters criticized Maduro for eating at an expensive steakhouse, as Venezuela’s economy is on the verge of collapse and many in the country are unable to eat. In Venezuela, a McDonald’s Big Mac costs $3.60, which is equivalent to a fifth of the monthly minimum wage, The Washington Post reported last week. According to the Herald, a single steak at Nusr-Et Steakhouse, Gokce’s Miami restaurant, costs $275. Photos on TripAdvisor suggest that the Istanbul location is somewhat cheaper. 
 
 Even Miami Mayor Francis Suarez joined in critiquing Maduro. Writing in Spanish, he called it “disgusting” to see Maduro eating while many in Venezuela starve. 
 
 Es repugnante ver al dictador Nicolas Maduro comiendo en este vídeo mientras en #Venezuela el pueblo se muere de hambre y decenas de miles cruzan las fronteras buscando un refugio y algo que comer. #SOSVenezuela @AmbCTrujillo pic.twitter.com/6lmvK8KMIq — Mayor Francis Suarez (@FrancisSuarez) September 18, 2018 
 
 After sharing the Miami restaurant’s phone number on Twitter, Rubio received more than 1,000 replies, many of them criticizing him for singling out a private business. 
 
 “You are using the platform you have earned as a public trust to incite harassment of a constituent who, it appears, isn’t breaking the law, but has views you don’t like,” said one response. “This is a shocking betrayal of your responsibility — downright Trumpian.” 
 
 Marco Rubio breaking Twitter's rules against targeted harassment to go after the saltbae guy for serving Maduro is about as 2018 as it gets on here https://t.co/x1oCjtpv6p — Nathan Bernhardt (@jonbernhardt) September 18, 2018 
 
 Some suggested that Rubio had violated Twitter’s terms of service, which prohibit users from posting other people’s phone numbers on the site. However, Twitter expressly states that this applies to “non-public, personal phone numbers,” a category which does not include a restaurant’s publicly listed phone number. 
 
 Earlier this month, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders tweeted out the New York Times’s phone number after the paper published an anonymous op-ed from a senior administration official who criticized the president. The paper was subsequently flooded with calls, many of them supportive. 
 
 Six hours after Rubio’s tweet, the steakhouse’s voice mail was, somewhat remarkably, not full. And Salt Bae, who was previously criticized in December 2017 for posing with a cigar next to a photo of Fidel Castro, had not responded. 
 
 More from Morning Mix: 
 
 Kavanaugh’s accuser waited years to come forward. Does that undercut her claim? 
 
 Anderson Cooper accuses Donald Trump Jr. of ‘tweeting lies’ with old hurricane photo ||||| Marco Rubio ಮರುಟ್ವೀಟಿಸಿದ್ದಾರೆ 
 
 I don’t know who this weirdo # Saltbae is, but the guy he is so proud to host is not the President of # Venezuela. He is actually the overweight dictator of a nation where 30% of the people eat only once a day & infants are suffering from malnutrition. https://twitter.com/nusr_ett/status/1041791316168990720 … ||||| Tweet with a location 
 
 You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more ||||| Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) gutter-sniped viral “weirdo” Salt Bae, aka Nusret Gökçe, after the Instagram-famous chef posted a video of himself serving steak to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro—continuing the senator’s recent bloodlust for shaming celebrity bottom-feeders in public forums. 
 
 I don’t know who this weirdo #Saltbae is, but the guy he is so proud to host is not the President of #Venezuela. He is actually the overweight dictator of a nation where 30% of the people eat only once a day & infants are suffering from malnutrition. https://t.co/sSNPK9cAAx — Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 18, 2018 
 
 “I don’t know who this weirdo # Saltbae is, but the guy he is so proud to host is not the President of # Venezuela. He is actually the overweight dictator of a nation where 30% of the people eat only once a day & infants are suffering from malnutrition,” tweeted the Florida senator in his first attack against the chef on Monday evening. 
 
 Then the senator went for the jugular, publishing the contact information for Salt Bae’s restaurant in Miami in an attempt to damage his business. 
 
 This guy @nusr_ett who admires dictator @NicolasMaduro so much actually owns a steakhouse in, of all places, #Miami. It’s called NUSR-ET STEAKHOUSE MIAMI located at 999 Brickell Avenue, Miami, FL 33131 
 
 The phone number is 1 305 415 9990 in case anyone wanted to call. https://t.co/7CDkgHVZWh — Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 18, 2018 
 
 “This guy @ nusr_ett who admires dictator @ NicolasMaduro so much actually owns a steakhouse in, of all places, # Miami,” said Rubio online. “It’s called NUSR-ET STEAKHOUSE MIAMI located at 999 Brickell Avenue, Miami, FL 33131 The phone number is 1 305 415 9990 in case anyone wanted to call. 
 
 But Rubio did not stop there: Following cavalry support from Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, the senator tweeted another attack in Spanish at 10:55 p.m., ensuring his opponent received a barrage of angry tweets before retiring to bed weary from battle. 
 
 Shaken by the outrage mob, Salt Bae deleted the tweet in which he served steak to a South American dictator. Rather than accept this submission, however, a bloodthirsty Rubio continued his attack into Thursday morning—the battle amplified by entrenched media institutions like The Washington Post. 
 
 #Salt Bae @nusr_ett⁩ deleted the tweet with the video of him lavishing dictator Maduro with a steak dinner while the people of #Venezuela starve. Fortunately @miamiherald downloaded it before he deleted it. Watch here:https://t.co/AC9qkFWyOw — Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 18, 2018 
 
 “ # Salt Bae @ nusr_ett⁩ deleted the tweet with the video of him lavishing dictator Maduro with a steak dinner while the people of # Venezuela starve,” said Rubio before directing his followers to a link where they could watch the controversial video. 
 
 As a Republican who has encouraged a military coup in Venezuela, Rubio loathes Maduro and has helmed a campaign to raise awareness for the leader’s crimes against his people. The senator’s attack against Salt Bae follows his sparring last week with Alex Jones—when he called the InfoWars conspiracy theorist “a clown” and threatened to “take care of” him without help from his security entourage. ||||| About 
 
 Salt Bae is a nickname given to Turkish chef Nusret Gökçe, who was widely discussed on social media following the circulation of a viral video in which he flamboyantly sprinkles salt on a carved steak. 
 
 Origin 
 
 On January 7th, 2017, Gökçe uploaded a video of himself carving a steak and sprinkling salt over his forearm on to the meat (shown below). Within 48 hours, the video gained over 2.4 million views and 8,700 comments. That day, Twitter user @lolalissaa reposted the video along the the message "so this is #saltbae." 
 
 
 
 
 
 Ottoman steak A video posted by nusr_et (@nusr_et) on Jan 7, 2017 at 2:44am PST 
 
 
 
 Spread 
 
 That evening, @lolalissaa reposted another video in which Gökçe hangs a cooked slab of meat over a woman's mouth, garnering upwards of 3,100 likes and 2,500 retweets in two days (shown below). 
 
 
 
 
 
 #saltbae done took it to a whole other level 
 
 pic.twitter.com/bRS8K56YZL — LoLa (@lolalissaa) January 8, 2017 
 
 
 
 Also on January 7th, 2017, Twitter user @elBeardedBandit tweeted a You vs. The Guy image macro featuring a screenshot of Gökçe sprinking salt (shown below, left). Within 48 hours, the tweet garnered more than 48,000 likes and 33,000 retweets. The following day, Twitter user @NerdyAjet posted an illustration of Gökçe (shown below, right). 
 
 
 
 
 
 On January 8th, Twitter user @Ratchetveli tweeted a parody video of himself making greit with the hashtag #GritsBae (shown below). That evening, a Twitter moments page titled "The world is obsessed with a Turkish meat monger" was created, highlighting tweets about Gökçe's video. 
 
 
 
 
 
 On January 9th, Twitter user @j.kube posted a parody of Gökçe's video in which he cuts the crust off several slices of bread, butters them and then sprinkles rainbow sprinkles over his forearm (shown below). In the coming days, several news sites published articles about Gökçe's online fame, including The Verge, The Telegraph, NY Mag, Wall Street Journal, NBC News, TIME and Elite Daily. 
 
 
 
 
 
 Marco Rubio Feud 
 
 On September 17th, 2018, Nurset Gökçe served Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro at his restaraunt Nusr-Et in Istanbul, Turkey. Gökçe posted a video of him serving Maduro, as well as presenting him with a Salt Bae t-shirt on his Instagram page, which has since been deleted (mirror below). 
 
 
 
 
 
 That day, Florida Senator Marco Rubio retweeted Gökçe's post and commented, "I don’t know who this weirdo #Saltbae is, but the guy he is so proud to host is not the President of #Venezuela. He is actually the overweight dictator of a nation where 30% of the people eat only once a day & infants are suffering from malnutrition." The tweet (shown below, left) received more than 2,100 retweets and 3,000 likes in 24 hours. 
 
 He continued to tweet about the subject, seemingly encouraging constituents to call Gökçe's restaurant to complain. He tweeted, "This guy @nusr_ett who admires dictator @NicolasMaduro so much actually owns a steakhouse in, of all places, #Miami. It’s called NUSR-ET STEAKHOUSE MIAMI located at 999 Brickell Avenue, Miami, FL 33131 The phone number is 1 305 415 9990 in case anyone wanted to call." 
 
 
 
 
 
 Some online took offense to Rubio's posting the restaurant's address and phone number. Washington Post tech reporter Tony Romm tweeted, "So. Sen Rubio last night tweeted out the name, address and phone number of a business with which he's having a political disagreement, and I wonder exactly how Twitter's going to handle that given its policies on real-world harm/elected officials." 
 
 
 
 
 
 Search Interest 
 
 External References
– If people hadn't heard of the celebrity chef Salt Bae before now—he is Internet famous for his distinctive way of salting meat—a series of slams from Marco Rubio is helping change that. The Florida senator went after the Turkish chef, real name Nusret Gokce, because Salt Bae hosted Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro at his restaurant in Istanbul and then boasted about it in a since-deleted video, reports the Observer. In Rubio's first tweet, he calls Salt Bae a "weirdo" and lodges his big complaint: Maduro is "the overweight dictator of a nation where 30% of the people eat only once a day & infants are suffering from malnutrition." Then Rubio makes the Florida connection. Noting that Salt Bae has a restaurant in Miami, Rubio posted the steakhouse's address and phone number and suggested that people call. He also added a critical tweet in Spanish. The senator took some flak for posting the restaurant's number, with some accusing him of "doxxing" Salt Bae and violating Twitter's harassment policies. The Washington Post, however, notes that Twitter has no restrictions about posting the phone number of public facilities such as a restaurant. Rubio also pushed back against the critics, saying Salt Bae deserved it for trying to score PR off "a criminal that is systematically starving the people of Venezuela." (Rubio is referring to conditions like this.) The Miami Herald notes that this isn't Salt Bae's first brush with controversy: The chef dressed up as another dictator reviled by many, Fidel Castro, soon after opening his restaurant in Miami. Rubio's parents were born in Cuba.