Government

Ron DeSantis Considers Suing Bud Light Over Anti-Gay Boycotts Because Why Not?

After getting his clock cleaned repeatedly by Disney, DeSantis decides to take on Budweiser.

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DeSantisRon “Rob” DeSantis keeps trying to dent Donald Trump’s 30-something point lead in the GOP primary and keeps getting his teeth kicked when his half-baked publicity stunts crash and burn. He tried to use his office to retaliate against Disney for admitting that gay people exist and discovered that Disney is much better at law-talkin’ stuff than his merry band of bush leaguers. His attorneys managed to get pantsed by Mouse House lawyers in increasingly humiliating ways ever since. Even their sole victory in the case was a loss.

He’s also facing a lawsuit brought by Foley Hoag (among others) over the kidnapping stunt where the Florida governor used state (and maybe federal) funds to fly migrants from Texas to Massachusetts.

Now he’s going after Bud Light’s LGBTQ marketing outreach, telling Fox News that he’s eyeing a shareholder derivative suit against Anheuser-Busch on behalf of Florida pensions.

Because Bud’s stock dipped… because there’s a right-wing Bud Light boycott… because Ron DeSantis called for that boycott. 

First of all, if Florida’s pension system is so heavily weighted on Bud Light that it’s “crushed” by a 10 percent share price dip in that one stock, then the fiduciaries breaching their duties are whoever runs Florida’s pension regime. There’s no way a pension fund pushed the entire state’s retirement funds to the center of the table and said, “We’re all in on piss water!”

On second thought, Florida might do that. But it’s unlikely.

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Also, I guess conservatives support boycotts now? Which is news because whenever they face a boycott they declare it an assault on free speech or push state laws banning investors from pulling out of sketchy companies.

Shareholder derivative actions like the one DeSantis proposed are commonly called “stock drop suits” and they’re usually frivolous.

Essentially, shareholders plead that the company’s board and leadership hurt the company — as reflected by the share value — either intentionally or through some sort of neglect. That’s all well and good when an asbestos manufacturer’s executives knowingly lie about risks and string investors along before the legal exposure timebomb destroys the whole company.

It’s not particularly compelling when a multinational beverage brand is off $6/share from its high and indeed UP 8 percent over the past year.

For this to work, DeSantis would need to prove that Bud executives knew that an inclusive LGBTQ marketing strategy would hurt the company and did it anyway. Except pro-LGBTQ marketing has proven successful for all brands in recent years — including Bud Light — and executives had no reason to think this year would be any different based on that history.

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This case wouldn’t survive a motion to dismiss in any competent court. If stock drop suits are “usually” frivolous, stock drop suits over boycotts are always frivolous. Liberal activists tried this against Wendy’s a few years ago, citing the boycott caused by the company’s refusal to commit to agricultural worker protections. The court swiftly kicked that to the curb.

No one seriously thinks companies can be sued over a boycott like this. Well, Elon Musk does, and given his crackerjack legal instincts, who are we to argue? Aren’t we only a few months removed from Musk declaring boycotts tortious interference? That guy is a whirlwind!

But as bad as the case is in the abstract, it’s way worse in the particulars. The proposed action would punish Bud for inspiring a boycott. Yet there wouldn’t have been any boycott, and Bud would’ve gone on enjoying returns on its LGBTQ outreach, without the intervention of people like… Ron DeSantis.

The Dylan Mulvaney ad that started all of this became a controversy on April 1, when she did an Instagram post for Bud Light. At the time, Bud traded at around $66/share. Which was already unusual — over the prior several months it traded around $60 and as recently as last October it traded in the mid-$40s.

For the WHOLE MONTH after the ad and amidst near constant outrage coverage, the stock remained steady. Where was the organic boycott?

In mid-April, DeSantis explicitly called upon troglodyte consumers to boycott the beverage company, telling Benny Johnson that “pushback is in order.”

It took another couple weeks for Bud Light to suffer a month-long stock slide that bottomed out about 18 percent down before trending up since June 1.

So, to recap, Ron DeSantis wants to bring a lawsuit that Bud Light should’ve known that — despite years of accumulated positive sales data — Ron DeSantis himself would agitate for a boycott that produced a minimal and seemingly temporary dip in share value.

DeSantis is not technically the pension, but it would invite some serious mischief if politicians could regularly use the platform of their office to trigger stock drops and then order state organs to file stock drop suits. A court isn’t going to look favorably on the concept of a politician manufacturing a derivative action.

This case hasn’t actually been brought and DeSantis cautiously limited his statement to promising an inquiry that could lead to a suit. Someone might be looking at the polls and thinking another litigation whupping isn’t worth it when Republican voters are already boycotting DeSantis.

Earlier: Disney’s Lawyers Are Better Than Ron DeSantis’s Lawyers
Disney Litigators Take Their Turn Beating The Hell Out Of Ron DeSantis With New Federal Lawsuit
Harvard Law’s Ron DeSantis Flunks Disney’s Contract Issue Spotter
FL Lege Allocates $12 Million For DeSantis To Kidnap More Migrants
Elon Musk Teases Tortious Interference Lawsuit Over Twitter Boycotts Because He’s Not A Lawyer… And Is A Moron

HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

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