Anheuser-Busch’s chief executive responded to criticism of its partnerships with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney on Friday, saying the company wasn’t trying to divide Americans. “We never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people,” Brendan Whitworth, the company’s CEO, said in a press release titled “Our Responsibility To America.”. “We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer.” The company sponsored a post promoting Bud Light’s March Madness contest on Mulvaney’s Instagram account. “Just found out this had to do with sports and not just saying it’s a crazy month!” wrote the 26-year-old TikTok star as part of the caption on the post. Regarding the controversy, Whitworth finally broke his silence over the issue but did not mention the sponsorship deal between Mulvaney and the nation’s largest beer company, which has been the subject of calls for a boycott. Rather than address reports that senior executives were kept in the dark regarding Mulvaney’s debut, Whitworth said he was “focused on building and protecting our remarkable history and heritage. “Moving forward, I will continue to work tirelessly to bring great beers to consumers across our nation,” said Whitworth.
Since the campaign began on April 1, the market value of the $132 billion beer company has dropped by $5 billion. Busch distributors nationwide have been feeling the impact of the ad fallout, with many bars in conservative states such as Tennessee and Wyoming refusing to carry Bud Light. There has also been a wave of bomb threats targeting Budweiser factories this week. Police responded to a call from an Anheuser-Busch facility in Van Nuys on Thursday, according to the Los Angeles Police Department. Patch was informed that several other beer manufacturing facilities around the country had also received bomb threats, according to a spokesperson for the St. Louis-based company. This statement by the company comes after they had previously defended their hiring of Mulvaney, an actress and female influencer with more than ten million followers on TikTok, where she documented her gender transition.
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In his statement, Whitworth didn’t mention Mulvaney’s sponsorship deal. Conservatives have slammed the beer maker’s ad campaigns as “gender propaganda.” Country music singer John Rich said he removed Bud Light cases from his Nashville bar, Travis Tritt called for a boycott, and Kid Rock made a viral video in which he appears to use several Bud Light cases as targets. Others, like Howard Stern and Joe Rogan, have condemned the conservative opposition to Mulvaney. Rogan drank Bud Light on a recent show and called the boycott effort ‘goofy.’ Meanwhile, Stern wondered aloud why Kid Rock and Tritt had “lost theirs— over this beer can thing,” adding: “I thought there must be a piece of this story that I’m missing, and I don’t know why – I’m not bothered by gay people or transsexual people. They don’t impact my life. They don’t hurt my life. I love when people are in love. You wanna be a woman, be a woman, you wanna be a dude, be a dude… Long as you ain’t hurting anybody, I’m on your team.”
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