John Oliver has called Budweiser’s response to the transphobic backlash against its partnership with transgender TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney a “huge misfire”.
Last month, the brewing company partnered with Mulvaney to promote its Bud Light March Madness contest, a move which prompted a wave of right-wing backlash on social media and a boycott of the brand.
Anheuser-Busch’s CEO since addressed the outrage in a statement, saying: “We never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people. We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer.”
Soon after, Budweiser released a video advertisement in connection with the statement, which the Last Week Tonight host branded “equally empty” on the show’s latest episode (Sunday 23 April).
“There is both nothing and a lot going on there,” Oliver laughed. “They are clearly so afraid of offending anyone.”
In the advertisement, the brand’s signature Clydesdale horse is shown running past American national monuments, including Missouri’s Gateway Arch, The Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC and New York City’s famous skyline.
Of the video, he said: “Shots of a horse running through the plains and ‘remember 9/11’, feels less like an ad and more like the results of feeding an AI program the prompt, ‘America, freedom, I’m sorry.’
“This feels like a huge misfire for Anheuser-Busch because when bigots are loudly announcing they don’t like your beer because they are bigots, that is an opportunity to say, ‘Then our beer is not for you.’”
Among the high-profile celebrities who’ve boycotted the brand are country singers Kid Rock and Travis Tritt.
Rock posted a video showing him donning a Make America Great Again hat while shooting boxes of Bud Light with an automatic rifle.
“F*** Bud Light and f*** Anheuser-Busch,” Rock says, looking into the camera.
Following his viral display of transphobic outrage, an old 2003 photo of him “chilling” with legendary drag queen Wanda resurfaced.
“There is always receipts! Here we have Kid Rock enjoying a bud light next to a drag Queen. It didn’t bother him back them. Yeah that’s right… he’s now trying to stay relevant so he spews fake outrage. But if it didn’t bother him then, it doesn’t really bother him now,” tweeted former West Virginia senator Richard N Ojeda.
