> According to the article, it was one Canadian employee told by one Canadian supervisor that this was a no-go. There was no "Poppies is bad!" memo from Austin or Seattle. It was how a single Canadian manager chose to interpret the dress code.
This is egregious cherry-picking from the article. While one sentence says "An employee of the Whole Foods in Ottawa says", the previous paragraph says "U.S.-based Whole Foods Market says poppies aren't allowed [...] which affects employees at its 14 locations across Canada", and the one before that (the first in the article) says "a national grocery store chain has banned its employees from wearing the symbol of remembrance". Later, the article says "A poppy does not comply with that policy, the company confirmed", referring to Whole Foods, not any specific location. The sentence that you're quoting, read with any context whatsoever, is clearly anecdotal evidence provided to support the claim that Whole Foods both has a policy against wearing poppies, and is enforcing that policy in at least one store.
> Further along in the article it shows the problem is provincial law
I don't know what the hell you're going on about here. "would not be protected" is vastly different from "is not permitted". This sentence merely clarifies that Whole Foods' action is not explicitly illegal, not that it is required under any law.