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Leo, board cochair at the Federalist Society, gave $350,000 to the group that called for a boycott over the brand's partnership with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
Leonard Leo, board cochair for the Federalist Society, a far-right group, was one of the major funders of the move to boycott Bud Light over its marketing campaign with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
Right-wing extremists took offense at Bud Light’s partnership with Mulvaney last year, for which the influencer made one post on Instagram where she unveiled personalized Bud Light cans with her face on them. They were only promotional items and were not produced widely.
Many on the right said they’d boycott Bud Light and other Anheuser-Busch InBev products. Conservative celebrities embraced the effort. Singer Kid Rock went so far as to shoot up cases of Bud Light with an assault rifle, a video of which he posted online. Mulvaney endured many insults and threats, and there were threats against Anheuser-Busch facilities as well.
Now tax documents viewed by The Guardian provide evidence of Leo’s role in the boycott. “Uncovered by the watchdog group Accountable.US, the filings for 2022 show the Concord Fund, a group linked to Leo, gave $350,000 to Consumers Defense, an arm of Consumers’ Research, not long before that group played a central role in the Bud Light boycott,” the publication reports.
“But Leo’s fundraising work ranges wider,” it continues. Another group to which Leo has ties, Donors Trust, gave millions to Consumers’ Research in 2021 and 2022. Consumers’ Research was founded in 1929 to advocate for consumer protection, but it was inactive for several years before becoming a far-right activist organization.
“It now claims to lead ‘the fight against ESG,’ or environmental, social and governance policies, in corporate America,” The Guardian reports. “It issues ‘woke alerts’ concerning companies it deems to be ‘putting progressive activists and their dangerous agendas ahead of customers.’” Some of those alerts in 2023 focused on Bud Light.
Will Hild, executive director of Consumers’ Research, has described Leo as “a good friend,” while Leo told The Washington Post last year that Consumers’ Research and Hild “are executing the most impactful pushback I know against ESG and other aspects of woke corporate culture.” Consumers’ Research is a client of Leo’s public relations firm, CRC Advisors.
The Federalist Society, founded in 1982, is an organization of lawyers and others who advocate for a conservative view of the law. In the group’s own words, posted on its website, “The Society’s main purpose is to sponsor fair, serious, and open debate about the need to enhance individual freedom and the role of the courts in saying what the law is rather than what they wish it to be.” Many of the federal judges appointed by Donald Trump have ties to the Federalist Society, including the Supreme Court justices he chose. Leo has been involved with the society for 25 years; he was executive vice president before becoming cochair of the board.
