Transgender social media influencer Dylan Mulvaney this week addressed her critics after right-wing protests unfolded on social media over her recent partnership with Bud Light.
"The reason I think I'm an easy target is because I'm still new to this," Mulvaney said Tuesday during an episode of “Onward With Rosie O' Donnell.” "I think going after a trans woman who has been doing this for 20 years is a lot more difficult.”
Mulvaney last month shared a sponsored post to her Instagram page promoting Bud Light’s March Madness contest, drawing swift backlash from conservative critics, who launched protests against Bud Light and its parent company, Anheuser-Busch, on social media.
In a viral Instagram video, singer-songwriter Kid Rock shot several cases of Bud Light with what appeared to be a semi-automatic rifle.
“F--- Bud Light and f--- Anheuser-Busch,” he said in the video.
Fellow country music star Travis Tritt responded to Mulvaney’s video by announcing that he will be “deleting all Anheuser-Busch products from my tour hospitality rider.”
“I know many other artists who are doing the same,” he wrote in a post on Twitter.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) last week also tweeted a photo of a case of Coors Light in the backseat of a car, writing, “I would have bought the king of beers, but it changed it’s gender to the queen of beers. So it’s made to chill from here on out.”
Similar criticism arose online after Mulvaney posted a second sponsored Instagram post last week, this time by Nike.
Caitlyn Jenner — who is also a transgender woman — said the brand’s partnership with Mulvaney is “an outrage.”
“As someone that grew up in awe of what Phil Knight did, it is a shame to see such an iconic American company go so woke!,” Jenner wrote on Twitter.
Mulvaney on Monday voiced concerns that hateful statements shared about her by celebrities and social media influencers with large followings will worsen real-world violence against the transgender community.
“The people that are talking about me on their podcast, I'm worried about their listeners,” she said. “It's a heavy time, and it's just time to step up for sure.”
Mulvaney, who publicly came out as transgender last year, added that she’s watched the world for transgender people grow much more dangerous even since beginning her own transition.
“I have watched it get so much worse, as my timeline has gone on,” she said, “and it's been very kind of odd to compare the two, my transition as well as all this anti-trans legislation simultaneously.”
More than 450 bills targeting the rights of LGBTQ people in the U.S. have been introduced this year in over 40 states, according to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), including a record-setting number of proposed laws that target transgender people, specifically.
At least 14 states since last year have enacted laws or policies that ban gender-affirming health care for minors, and more than 20 now prohibit transgender women and girls from competing on female sports teams.
Transgender students in at least seven states are also prevented from using school restrooms or locker rooms consistent with their gender identity, according to the Movement Advancement Project, which tracks laws and policies that impact LGBTQ Americans.
