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Ted Cruz weighs in on Target boycott, optimistic that a message has been sent to ‘woke’ corporations

May 27, 2023 | | Print Article

The conservative boycott of Target over its pushing of transgender and LGBTQ+ merchandise for Pride month has been a smashing success with the company’s stock value taking a hit in the billions, leading Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to express optimism that a message has been sent, but tempering expectations about whether it would be sustainable for the long term.

On the latest episode of his podcast “The Verdict,” the Lone Star State Republican discussed the differences between boycotts of Target and Disney as opposed to Bud Light, explaining that a prolonged boycott against the two is unlikely because, much like the NFL which also alienated consumers with its left-wing politics, there are really no alternatives to corporations that are either very unique or very convenient while there are a wide variety of other beers available.

“It’s amazing how many big companies don’t understand their customers and don’t respect their customers. Because if you respect your customers, you don’t insult them. If you respect your customers you focus on what your customers want, and you don’t try to impose your political ideology or your extreme views on your customers,” Cruz said during the discussion on the ongoing boycotts.

“Historically, conservatives have typically been not very good at boycotts,” he said. “Part of the problem is that for some things it’s hard to substitute, Disney’s an example where you can be annoyed at Disney, but if your kids really want to go to Disney World, that can be hard to say no to. There’s not a lot of alternatives. There’s Six Flags but Disney World is a pretty unique offering.”

After listing some of Disney’s movies as examples, he continued, “That is a difficult product for many people to give up permanently. I think the same thing is true about pro sports. I think lots of sports fans are unhappy with the NFL or the NBA and all of the woke nonsense, but at the same time, people, and I’ll put myself in this camp, really love going to sports events and cheering on their teams and so, it’s a painful boycott.”

“What really came to bite Bud Light is that wasn’t a hard boycott. It’s difficult for nobody on planet Earth if you were gonna order a Bud Light to say ‘I’ll have a Coors Light,” Cruz explained. “Like that’s a very simple substitution. I’m not sure many people could go through a blind taste test and tell the difference, and so it’s an easy substitution.”

“Target… we’ll see how prolonged and easy a substitution it is. There’s Walmart — there are alternatives. I will say Targets are located in a lot of areas and very convenient for a lot of shoppers. So we’ll see if this becomes a persistent consequence or not. But whether it is sustained, the fact that it was so concentrated and intense has, I think certainly made a real impression on the Target executives, I hope. But also on the next executive,” Cruz said, expressing optimism that the message was sent.

He added, “If we want to stop Corporate America from going woke, we’ve got to change the cost-benefit analysis so that when the next executives are thinking about it, the downside of the ledger is bigger and more problematic and I do think the last couple of weeks have dramatically increased the downside, not just for these companies, but for every other.”

“And that’s a good thing for those of us that would like companies just to get back to selling their damn products and keep their idiotic politics out of our lives,” Cruz concluded.

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Chris Donaldson
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