RADIOMay 24, 2023

PROOF Bud Light, Target boycotts ARE WORKING. But will it last?

Bud Light sales have dropped dramatically since the Dylan Mulvaney controversy, and now Target is taking steps after its over-the-top pride month/LGBTQ products caused backlash nationwide. The boycotts — and YOUR stance against both companies — are working. But will this actually last?! Typical boycotts usually don’t see longterm effects, but resistance from Americans in these two situations may be different. Glenn and Stu discuss what makes today's Bud Light & Target backlash different and what MUST happen to truly make a long-lasting difference…

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: I'm going to tell the story here, of Target. Now, it came out in the New York Post.

Just a couple of days ago. Target's top executive dismisses the social media uproar over the retailer's new line of LGBTQ friendly kid's clothing. Outraged shoppers have posted videos and images on social media, showing bathing suits, that offer an extra crotch coverage, as well as rainbow-colored onesies for infants and children.

Other offerings that raise conservative haggles, include T-shirts that say Pride Adult Drag Queen.

Trans people will always exist. Girls, gays, theys. So in the podcast last week for Fortune, called Leadership Next, the CEO of -- of Target, Brian Cornell, was asked about the backlash to woke capitalism.

And specifically about Budweiser and Disney. He said, you know, I think these are just good business decisions. And it's the right thing to do for society. And it's a great thing for our brand. The things we've done from a D, E, and I -- diversity, equity, and inclusion standpoint. It's adding value. It's helping us drive sales. It's building greater engagement with both our teams and our guests, and those are just the right things for business today.

Spokesperson for the company told the Associated Press, the tuck-friendly swimsuits are only offered now in adult sizes. Kid's collection does not feature the label.

STU: Oh, that's great.

GLENN: Oh, that's nice.

Yeah, when we think about purpose at Target, he said. It's really about helping all the families. And the word all is very important.

Most of America shops at Target. So we want to do the right thing that supports families across the country. I know that the focus on diversity and inclusion and equity, has fueled much of our growth over the last nine years.

Huh. So it was -- last week, the story was. They're going to stick to their guns. Well, Target came out yesterday, Tuesday, and said, the retail giant is going to pull some of its LGBTQ-friendly kid's clothing from its stores, after facing customer backlash.

Just days after the company's top executive dismissed the social media uproar, the Minneapolis-based chain said, one of the main factors in the nationwide adjustment, ahead of Pride Month, was because some customers had become violent with workers.

Well, I hope that that is not true, and if that is happening, I don't want anything to do with that.

STU: Any of it. If you were to harass a Target employee, violently over clothing.

GLENN: You're an idiot.

STU: Of any sort. But still, this is what they always say.

GLENN: Yeah, I know. So I don't know if I believe anything.

STU: Yeah, they always say, we've had death threats. They have always said. The death threat thing is particularly comical for anyone who happens to be in AM talk radio.

GLENN: Yeah. Suck it up, buttercup. Jeez.

Since introducing this year's collection, we've experienced threats impacting our team member's sense of safety and well-being, while at work, said the Target spokesperson.

Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plants, including removing items that have been at the center of the most significant confrontational behavior.

Target declined to say whether it would remove the tuck-friendly women's swimsuits that allow trans women.

They're men, who have not had gender-affirming operations to conceal their junk.

My words, not theirs. One of the LGBTQ brands being pulled, however, is Aprallen (phonetic), which makes T-shirts, sweatshirts, bags. Mainly because, you know, it's a cult, and Satanic-themed.

LGBTQ features and stuff. I mean, I don't know. Criticism has been widespread, Target spokesperson said.

Folks are reaching out with feedback. While some are sharing it with constructive criticism. They disagree with product decisions that we have made. Target shares were down, 3 percent yesterday. At closing.

So it's good for their brand. Good for their brand.

No. Actually not good. You are the beginning to have an effect.

You -- anyone -- anyone that you know that is like, let's go and tear it down.

Tell them they're a moron.

You're beginning to win!

Already, ESG -- any ESG fund is way down.

They're not introducing -- they're introducing half of the number of funds, than they did last year.

That's because you're winning.

Now you have Budweiser on the ropes. I mean, have you heard the ads from one of the local bottling companies in Alabama.

Did an ad. And they're -- it's a really bad ad. But it's like, we're sorry. We don't have anything to do with this.

We have nothing to do -- we're all local people just like you. We disagree.

We have nothing to do with this.

But it's getting -- it's bad.

STU: I think this is a really fascinating case study. The whole Bud Light thing.

And I think the Target thing is rising to that level as well.

In which, I don't know exactly how these things work. Or how you do them, or how you make them happen.

You know, we were talking about this a little off-air the other day. Obviously, Miller Lite is one of the big alternatives for Bud Light. I swear Bud Light is the one -- this is Sara Gonzales' point which I'm stealing, but I swear Bud Light leaked the Miller Lite ad because it was old.

GLENN: Oh, sure they did. I'm sure they did.

STU: But Miller Lite is the alternative. Right? But then they were doing this too.

Now, of course, Coors is -- owns Miller Lite. So Coors Light and Miller Lite are in on all this stuff too.

And Michelob Ultra also released an ad a while ago, that had a transgender athlete that we just all missed. I don't even know what happened.

GLENN: That's okay.

I don't care who teaches everybody a lesson, somebody needs to teach -- be taught the lesson.

STU: And that's what's fascinating here.

Maybe that's the answer. Because you really can't boycott everybody that does things that you don't like. It wouldn't even be consistent with capitalism to boycott everyone that disagrees with you.

GLENN: It's not even possible.

STU: It's not possible in this society. It's also not consistent with the principles of capitalism. Like, you're not supposed to do only business with people you agree with.

That being said, when you have things like this, that's making a big difference. Their sales are down 24 percent.

Their stock does seem to finally be reacting to this. For a while, it hadn't really reacted.

GLENN: Because I don't think people thought it was serious. And thought it was going to last.

STU: Right. And so now you're seeing them panic. You see a real reaction. Disney is the same way.

I don't know that Disney's business was particularly harmed by any of the stuff that happened there.

But it might be.

They -- a lot of the stuff that has been talked about.

We talked about it with the DeSantis situation.

They acted like they were blaming DeSantis for this 1 billion project that they shut down.

When in reality, they pretty much shut it down previously.

But still, like, nobody wants to be the next Disney. Nobody wants to have -- nobody wants to be the next Bud Light.

Nobody wants to be the next Target. Why bother with this stuff?

Just stay out of this discussion completely.

GLENN: Well, I will tell you that I hear from Ramaswamy. What's his name?

Yeah. Vivek Ramaswamy. He said, I talked to business leaders all the time, Glenn.

He says, there's a few of them that are held hostage. He said, that they're like, we don't want to do any of this with Vivek.

We just can't not do it.

STU: I think that's more common than we realize.

GLENN: I think so too.

You start teaching.

I don't know if Target is a true believer or not.

Boy, they sure seem like it.

STU: But the fact that they're moving clothes from the front to the back.

GLENN: They're only doing it in certain cities, et cetera, et cetera.

I think they just -- I -- boycott.

Don't -- and this is a women's thing, really. The men who goes -- that go to Target. They're like, I'm going to tear your face off. Are not the ones that they are going to concern themselves with.

STU: Also, are there actually any of the people -- I've never seen one. It's possible. I suppose. Some idiot is doing something dumb.

GLENN: I don't know. But one person does something dumb, and then it becomes the whole thing.

STU: Yes.

GLENN: But women, and I -- I mean, Ricki, our executive producer, she's like, I'm trying not to go to Target. It's been three days. I'm having a hard time not going to Target. I'm like, well, we can -- I can give you a 12-step class to go to.

We'll do 12 steps to get you off of Target. But it's the women that will make the difference in this one. And if you keep this up, if you teach Target the Anheuser-Busch lesson, you've got two in a row. And kind of with Disney. Three.

STU: Yeah. I just Disney counts. I think too, one of the things that's interesting with the Bud Light thing. And I've gone through this myself. It's not as much about some sort of organized boycott against this company.

Honestly, I don't know that -- I've heard a lot of people talking about that. It's not like a typical boycott that we've been on the other side of. Right? Where you have all these big organizations.

One of the things I think with Bud Light. And maybe Target is getting to that point.

Is that it's created some level of like societal, like, ickiness.

Like, it's one of those things. I think I mentioned this story.

I went to a wedding, and they had all the beers up there.

You can choose whatever you like.

And normally, I'll have one beer at a wedding. I'll probably have a Bud Light, just because it's the one I -- but I looked at it, and I was like, eh, I don't want to get a conversation about transgender issues tonight with somebody. I'll take a Miller Lite.

And I think that is like, what is actually affecting sales.

I don't know, that everybody would be like. Yes. We have people who are -- Kid Rock is shooting his Bud Light with machine guns. Maybe that's part of it. But I think part of it, too, is people want to avoid it.

And it's created this societal pressure on people, to just choose something else.

GLENN: That's -- when that happens, when somebody comes into the house with a Target bag, or you say, oh, I got this at Target.

And they'll say, you're shopping at Target?

STU: Yeah. Yeah.

GLENN: That's when this will change. That's when this will change.

STU: That's when it happens. It's amazing.

GLENN: I've been saying this for a while. I have really good feelings. Bad crap is coming our way. Don't get me wrong.

For those of you who listen for the doom and gloom, I'm still here.

But good things are happening as well.

There is something happening in America. Anheuser-Busch going down and staying down. And now, just in a couple of days, I mean, the icky feeling happened with me and my wife.

When we were walking through Target, and it's right there.

It's in your face.

And as I'm walking down the aisle of Target, right in front of the cashier. And I see all of this.

I'm like, you know, really?

This is who you are? This is who you think we are?

You think that transgendered needs a -- a display up front?

How many transgender people are there?

You are grooming our children. It really bothered me. Really bothered me.

STU: Yeah. And, you know, when you look at -- we just talked about this with the social media alert from the government yesterday.

They sent us a positive, one of the things about social media was it helped people -- what was it?

Developed their identity in LGBTQ. That was one of the positive effects of social media.

They had tons of negatives like suicide and everything else. But one of the positives was, if you happen to be LGBTQ, this helps you develop your identity.

And it's like, well, that's just saying, that social media is there, to walk you -- I mean, grooming is -- it's actually a really good word for that.

GLENN: It is. It is.

STU: It's different than the criminal version of it.

But it's a pretty applicable word.

GLENN: You know, they say, the thing that one generation tolerates, the next will embrace.

If you look at casual sex, we tolerated Bill Clinton.

Well, it depends on what the definition of is, is. And all of a sudden, it became totally cool.

Sex, and oral sex. All of that, totally fine.

Kids doing it in schools, almost immediately. Okay?

Remember that -- where was that story that was in Virginia.

STU: Alexandra, Virginia. Anyway, there was a -- this happened over night.

What are we tolerating? We are now tolerating Satanism.

We are now tolerating our children being groomed for trans drag shows. You don't want this embraced as a society.

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The most INSANE Deep State story you've never heard

Was an NGO with deep government ties trying to RESTART the opium trade in Taliban-run Afghanistan while former Taliban members were on its payroll...only to be caught DESTROYING the evidence?! The State Department's Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy Darren Beattie joins Glenn Beck to expose what he found when he was made Acting President of the United States Institute of Peace. Plus, he debunks ProPublica’s claim that DOGE “targeted” an “Afghan scholar who fled the Taliban.”

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Darren, welcome to the program. How are you? Darren, are you there? Is he there?

STU: Hmm.

GLENN: Okay. Check if he's there. Is he? Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney.

STU: Trying to shut him down. They don't want peace. They don't want peace.

GLENN: They don't. They don't.

He is -- he is a big-time anti-globalist. I've got to tell you, what we're doing with the State Department. I absolutely love. The State Department has been a big problem for this country for a very long time. It's what's gotten us into these global wars. These endless wars, and everything he is.

And, I mean, I don't know what happened to Marco rube, but he is tremendous.

And the way president Trump is appointing different people like Darren, it's fantastic. Darren, are you there? Darren.

STU: Something must be wrong with the lines. Because we are talking to him offline on the phone here. And it does seem to be working, but not coming through our broadcast board here for whatever reason.

GLENN: Well, let's see if we can get that fixed, and maybe let me just talk here for five, six minutes on something else. Then we'll take a break and come back and see if we can get him.

There's something else that I really want to talk about. And that is this flag-burning thing. Now, it's not an amendment.

This is something that the president is putting up in an executive order and has very little teeth to it.

But I -- I -- look, I understand. As a guy putting an enormous flagpole up at my house today.

I mean, an enormous flagpole.

I love the flag. I love it!

And there are a few things that make me more angry than see somebody you set our flag on fire.

For a lot of people, that's a punch in the gut, especially our military people. And it has been planted on distant battlefields. It's raced after victory. Saluted in the morning, or should be in our schools and folded and given to the hands of grieving families. It feels like spitting on every sacrifice, that ever made this nation possible. And the argument against flag burning is really simple: It dishonors the idea of all of that. Okay?

And it defends millions of people, including me. It disrespects, I think the veterans that bled. The families who mourned. The dream that binds us together.

However, here's the hard truth: Symbols only mean something, in a land where freedom is alive.

If you outlaw the burning of a flag, the you have placed the cloth above the Constitution that it represents. You have made the flag an idol.

We don't worship idols. If you can only praise the flag and never protest it, it just stops being a symbol of freedom. And starts being an idol of obedience.

Now, that's the argument for allowing it. At least to me.

Because the real strength of a free nation is -- is to -- it's -- it's how we protect, not the speech we love, but how we endure the speech we hate!

And the Supreme Court has already ruled on this. And, you know, they -- the line they drew wasn't an easy one. Freedom of speech, stops where it directly -- directly insights violence. And that's it same thing, kind of, in this executive order.

You can burn the flag. But if I'm not mistaken, but if it incites violence, then you're in trouble.

And that's true. But the bar of inciting violence is so incredibly high. And it's -- it doesn't have anything to do with speech that offends. It's not speech that stirs anger. Not speech that wants you to punch the speaker in the mouth. It's speech only, that provokes imminent and specific violence.

And unless it's that be with the government doesn't have any right to -- to get into the business of silencing speech. Ever. Ever. Ever.

It is a hard line. And that standard is really hard. It's painfully hard.

Because what our citizenship requires, this is civics. What our citizenships require, is that we defend -- oh, I hate this.

We defend the right of your opponent to mock everything that we hold sacred.

Now, I want you to think of this. You can burn a Bible. You can burn the Word of God. But some want to make it illegal to burn a flag. Where are our priorities? You can burn the Constitution. The words that actually are the ones that stir us into action. But you can't burn a flag.

You can't burn a Koran. Can't burn them. Can't. Can't.

You will -- you will quickly come to a quick end, not legally. But you will come to a quick end. I don't ever want to be like that. Ever!

You burn a Bible. I think you're a monster. What is wrong with you? What is wrong with you?

But you have a right to do it. Why are we drawing a line around the flag? It -- the reason is -- is because we feel things so passionately. And that is really a good thing, to feel love of country so passionately. But then we have to temper that. My father used to tell me, that I think this country needs to hear over and over again, every day. My father -- we would talk to somebody. And we would walk away. And he would go, I so disagree with everything that man just said. But, Glenn, son, he would say. I will fight to the death for his right to say it. He used to say that to me all the time. Which now lees me to believe, I know where I've got my strong opinions from. Because dad apparently would disagree with a lot of people all the time.

But that was the essence of freedom. That is the essence of what sets us apart. Standing for universal, eternal rights like free speech. It's not easy. It means you have to take the size of those people that offend you. It means -- it doesn't mean you have to disagree with it. You can fight against it. You can argue back and forth.

But you -- can you tolerate the insults to the things that you love most. That is so hard, and that is why most of the world does not have freedom of speech. It's too hard! But our Founders believed people are better than that. Our citizens can rule themselves!

And the only way you can rule yourself is if you don't have limits on freedom of speech. So the question is, do we want to remain free? Or do we want to just feel good? It really is that simple. It's why no one else has freedom of speech. It's too hard! I think we're up to the task. Okay. Give me 60 seconds. And then we will try again.

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(music)
All right. Let me -- let me bring Darren in. Darren, are you there now?

DARREN: Yes!
GLENN: Oh, God. Thank goodness.
Thank you for putting up with us. I don't know what happened with the phone system. But, first of all, tell me what the US Institute of Peace is. I've never even heard of it.

DARREN: That is a fantastic question. And I'll try to give the abbreviated answer, because I know we don't have several hours.

GLENN: Good. I know.

DARREN: But US Institute of Peace is one of lesser known, but quite important member of the NGO archipelago, that was created in the '80s. It belongs to the same cohorts as national endowments for democracy.

GLENN: Oh.

DARREN: And some other -- some other better known NGOs that really in the broad context of things. In kind of the sweep of things, was created as a kind of reorganization of the government structure in the aftermath of the church type committee hearings that expose a lot of the dirty dealings of government agencies such as the CIA, and so sort of a broader response to that government lie was to create this NGO layer of governance, with an armed distant plausible deniability, a kind of chameleon character of not exactly being government, not exactly being private, in order to fulfill some of those more sensitive functions that had been exposed in the course of the church hearings.

And so US Institute of Peace is one of those NGOs that had particular focus on conflict regions. But, of course, as I think you -- you suggested earlier, peace requires at the very least, an asterisk. Because there involves a lot of things, that conventional, most American citizens would not think should belong as part of the portfolio of something calling itself an institute of peace.

GLENN: So what was the thing with the -- with this Taliban member that was getting money from us?

DARREN: Right. So this is an interesting case. So there's a whole saga of a takeover of the US institute of peace under -- under DOGE.

And that's really a fascinating story unto itself. Just to give you a sense of what these characters were like. They barricaded themselves in the offices.

They sabotaged the physical infrastructure of the building. There were reports of there being loaded guns within the offices.

GLENN: Wow!

DARREN: There was one, like, hostage situation where they held a security guard under basically kind of a false imprisonment type situation. It was extremely intense.

Far more so than the better known story of USAID. And in the course of all of that, they tried to delete a terabyte of data, of accounting information that would indicate what kind of stuff they were up to.

What kind of people they were paying. And in the course of that, DOGE found that one of the people on their payroll. Was this curious figure, who had a prominent role in the Taliban government. And then seemed to kind of play a bunch of angles across each other.

Sort of one of these sixer types in the middle of Afghanistan.

The question is, what the heck is an organization like this, having an individual, who is a former Taliban member on their payroll.

It underscores how incredibly bizarre the whole arrangement is. And to just reinforce that. I think even more bizarre than having this former Taliban guy on the payroll is the kind of schizophrenic posture exhibited by the chief -- one truly bizarre thing is that one of the US Institute of Peace's main kind of policy agendas was basically lamenting the fact that the opium trade had dissipated under Taliban leadership. They had multiple reports coming out, basically saying, this is horrible, that the opium trade is diminished under the Taliban. Meaning, finding some way to restore it. How bizarre is that!

GLENN: What was their thinking?

DARREN: Well, it's -- it's very strange, and it depends on what kind of rabbit holes you want to go down. But the whole story of opium and Afghanistan and its connection to, you know, government entities, is a -- is a very intricate and delicate and fascinating one. But it seems very clear that the US Institute of Peace was involved in that story to some degree because their public reports. They had a full-the time guy of basically lamenting the fact that the opium trade dissipated under the Taliban. And, meanwhile, they're funding this former Taliban guy.

GLENN: Unbelievable. Now, ProPublica got this. And you have released the statement on it. And ProPublica just completely white-washed this -- said this guy was a victim, and his family was taken hostage. Was his family ever taken hostage because he was exposed?

And correct the ProPublica story, would you?

DARREN: Yeah, I mean, the ProPublica thing, as usual and as expected was a total joke.

GLENN: Yes.

DARREN: I mean, this guy, I'm not an expert on this particular person's history. But what's very clear is he was a former Taliban guy, and he was probably one of these people, who was playing all sides, made a lot of enemies. I know that there were several kind of attempts on his life by the Taliban, in the course of various -- various decades.

This has nothing to do with -- with DOGE.

I mean, he's a known quantity in the region.

And somebody who has made a lot of enemies.

And he was not -- he was on the payroll of the US institute of peace.

And nobody is expecting something like that. So then, and, again, there's this sort of hostile takeover situation.

Where the people are barricading he themselves in. Trying to delete all this data.

And sure enough, what's in the data, is stuff like this.

These random former Taliban guy, making his contract with $130,000.

GLENN: You know, this is the -- this is the real Deep State stuff, that I think bothers people so much.

Look, we expect our CIA to do stuff, we don't necessarily want to do it. We expect it.

When it's in the State Department.

When every department is pushing out money to NGOs to overthrow governments and everything else.

It's out of control!

It's just completely out of control.

And who is overseeing all of that.

DARREN: That's a great question.

I think part of the NGO -- UCEF was almost a cutout of a cutout.

A fourth of its money came from USAID.

In many ways, it was a cutout of USAID. Which itself was a cutout.

So there are many layers of distance. Plausible deniability.

And UCEF, I think institutionally really perfected this chameleon structure of being able to plausibly present itself as government. When that was convenient for what they were doing.

And also to present itself as a private organization, when that was convenient.

It's a very intricate setup that they had, that was truly optimized for this chameleon character of plausible denial operations. In conflict zones. Doing God knows what, with American taxpayer money.

And it's just an absolute hornet's nest.

We have recovered that terabyte that they tried to delete. And once we get things settled in the building itself, I intend to do a kind of transparency effort, whereby we release all of this material to the public.

GLENN: Good. Good.

DARREN: Just like I'm doing at the State Department. I'm currently acting as secretary at the State Department. And doing a transparency effort here. After I eliminated the global engagement center, which was sort of the internal censorship office within the State Department, decided, we've got to -- we've got to air this out to the public.

So within the next couple of weeks.

We'll have our next tranche of helps you of thousands of emails, documenting what this were doing.

GLENN: I would love you to go back on, through those emails.

I think you guys in the State Department are doing an amazing job. Thanks for being on.