<\/p>\n
A line of customers waits to enter Hive Bakery in Flower Mound, Texas, Saturday, July 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Juan Figueroa\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
Owner Haley Popp poses for a photo at Hive Bakery in Flower Mound, Texas, Saturday, July 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Juan Figueroa\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
A box of pastries is prepared for a customer at Hive Bakery in Flower Mound, Texas, Saturday, July 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Juan Figueroa\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
Taylor Bird of Carrollton, Texas receives his order at Hive Bakery in Flower Mound, Texas, Saturday, July 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Juan Figueroa\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
Owner Haley Popp restocks pastries at Hive Bakery in Flower Mound, Texas, Saturday, July 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Juan Figueroa\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
A line of customers waits to enter Hive Bakery in Flower Mound, Texas, Saturday, July 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Juan Figueroa\/The Dallas Morning News<\/p>\n
FLOWER MOUND \u2014 A few days before July 4, Haley Popp typed out a few thoughts about the country\u2019s 250th birthday<\/a>.<\/p>\n Popp, who owns Hive Bakery in Flower Mound<\/a>, did not feel patriotic. Some years, the bakery sells red, white and blue cookies or cupcakes to celebrate Independence Day. Not this year.<\/p>\n “The 4th of July seems ridiculous given the state of the country,” she wrote on Facebook<\/a> after work on a Tuesday. “We\u2019ve never been more embarrassed of what America has become.”<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Some called the bakery to complain. A few angry emails trickled in. Even her mother, a Republican who supports President Donald Trump<\/a>, said she should celebrate the holiday.<\/p>\n Popp, a 45-year-old mother of three, shrugged off the criticism. On July 3, she posted again, this time calling Make America Great Again, or MAGA<\/a>, an adversarial cult “perpetuating the downfall of our country” and the Trump administration a “fascist regime.”<\/p>\n The next day,\u00a0Popp and her staff sold sugar cookies decorated with an upside down American flag, a symbol of national distress, and the words “under distress” in white buttercream frosting. Popp assumed the spotlight would dim.<\/p>\n Related: Flower Mound bakery goes viral for cookies protesting July 4, country’s political state<\/a><\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n She was wrong. Two days later, she drove to the bakery to get some work done on a sweltering Monday. She did not know yet that an influential far-right group called\u00a0Libs of TikTok had shared her posts to its millions of followers.<\/p>\n That day, the bakery\u2019s phone rang and rang. On the other end, a man told her he hoped her bakery burns down. Another said he believed in her freedom of speech but also his Second Amendment right to own a firearm. When she asked if that was a threat, he hung up.<\/p>\n Online, people called her fat, told her to shut up and bake, and said she should get out of the country. Fox News<\/a> and The New York Post covered the ordeal.<\/p>\n This attention was not new to\u00a0Popp, who spars weekly with her like-minded brother and conservative parents on a podcast called The Necessary Conversation, which they call a sort of family therapy. They debate everything from immigration, transgender rights<\/a>, the Epstein files<\/a> and the Iran war.<\/p>\n “My daughter is fierce in what she believes in. She is outspoken, hard working, and has a drive to get things done the right way,” her mother, Mary Lou Kultgen, said in an email.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n But, she added, “Having different political beliefs from my kids is hard. I sometimes think..what did we do wrong? LOL but this is life.”<\/p>\n Popp is perhaps not what you would expect in a suburban Texas baker. She peppers conversation with four-letter words, has magenta-colored hair and a septum nose piercing. She is covered in tattoos of Frida Kahlo<\/a> and characters from classic 1980s movies like The Lost Boys, Labyrinth and E.T.<\/a><\/p>\n On errands around Flower Mound, she is used to both suspicious side eyes and warm smiles from strangers who recognize her as “that bakery owner.”<\/p>\n “I refuse to be caged,” she said. “You can\u2019t tell me what to do. It\u2019s my business. It\u2019s my life.”<\/p>\n Her bakery, named Hive for\u00a0Popp\u2019s love of bees, is wedged among a bridal boutique, an eyebrow salon and a smattering of coffee shops in a development called Parker Square in this deep-red, affluent suburb of Dallas.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Popp did not set out to work as a professional baker. After graduating from Lewisville High School, she studied fashion at Kansas State University and designed juniors\u2019 clothing for a department store chain in her 20s.<\/p>\n She married her college sweetheart and moved to Colorado for a few years before returning to Texas for her husband\u2019s job.\u00a0Popp stayed home with their three children, now ages 21, 19 and 17.<\/p>\n When her oldest son\u2019s first birthday approached,\u00a0Popp, inspired by the reality show Ace of Cakes, decided to take a shot at baking the birthday cake. The chocolate confection resembled a whimsical Mad Hatter, the fictional character in Alice\u2019s Adventures in Wonderland.<\/p>\n Aesthetically, it was a disaster, she said. Without support beams, the tiered cake collapsed beneath the weight of the fondant. She would do better next time, she thought.<\/p>\n Soon,\u00a0Popp was making custom cakes for friends and neighbors and working at a handful of bakeries, including at a grocery store, while running a home-based bakery and saving money to start her own place. She opened Hive in 2016.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Within the first year, she angered some in the community with rainbow Pride cookies. Later, a cake that read “My Body, My Choice” prompted a flurry of angry phone calls. In 2024, sugar cookies decorated with the face of Minnesota\u00a0Gov. Tim Walz<\/a>, then the Democratic vice presidential nominee, created a furor and wave of death threats.<\/p>\n “Haley always says what\u2019s on her mind,” said her brother, Chad Kultgen, 50, who lives in Los Angeles. “She\u2019s incredibly talented and hardworking, and she doesn\u2019t back down.”<\/p>\n Related: Flower Mound bakery faces backlash for Tim Walz cookies<\/a><\/p>\n Popp\u2019s parents have occasionally worried her business would suffer if she shared her liberal opinions in a red state, her brother said. Perhaps for good reason. Businesses, from Target to Anheuser-Busch, have navigated boycotts<\/a> in recent years over their politics.<\/p>\n For Hive, the conflict has driven anger, but also led to a sales boom.<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n As angry messages roll in, so do supportive emails. The bakery gained tens of thousands of followers on social media. The line at Hive snaked outside in the heat as customers drove from across North Texas to purchase “Under distress” cookies or slices of cake. With just 10 or so employees, the bakery was forced to shut down early a couple days to catch up on orders.<\/p>\n Julia Kelley, of\u00a0Lewisville, was among the new customers waiting in line on a recent afternoon. Kelley learned about the bakery on Instagram<\/a> and said she was horrified by some of the derogatory comments.<\/p>\n “She is just speaking her mind about what she thinks is right,” Kelley said. “There are a lot of haters out there, so I wanted to come support them.”<\/p>\n The tumult at the bakery became fodder for\u00a0Popp\u2019s family podcast, which her brother got the idea for in 2022. Trump had driven a crater-sized wedge between the siblings and their parents, who were barely speaking to one another. Around them, families were estranged because of politics, and they didn\u2019t want that.<\/p>\n Now, when they start to fight about immigration, Trump\u2019s latest statement or religion, they stop. “Save it for the pod,” they say.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n