Following Bud Light’s short-lived social media partnership earlier this year with transgender influencer and activist Dylan Mulvaney, singer Kid Rock was one of the brand’s swiftest and harshest critics. His bombastic boycott of the beer, which launched a national whirlwind of transphobic rhetoric, inspired other conservative public figures — from politicians to other musicians — to condemn the brand.
There were signs in the ensuing months that Rock’s stance on drinking Bud wasn’t perhaps as hardline as he publicly declared. In July, CNN reported that Kid Rock's Big Ass Honky Tonk & Rock 'n' Roll Steakhouse in Nashville was quietly serving the brand again. In August, the singer was seen drinking it himself. However, it appears he’s now publicly backing off the boycott.
On Nov. 16, according to Newsweek, Kid Rock told “Fox News” host Sean Hannity that he “didn't want to be in the party of cancel cultures and boycotts that ultimately hurt working-class people.” He said he’d reconsidered the boycott in light of his religious beliefs: “As a God-fearing man, as a Christian, I have to believe in forgiveness. They made a mistake, all right. What do you want, hold their head under water and drown them and kill people's jobs? I don't want to do that.”
Kid Rock’s interview came just hours after it was announced that Anheuser-Busch InBev’s US chief marketing officer, Benoit Garbe, is stepping down at the end of the year amid a continued decline in Bud Light sales.
