Lauren Boebert's Attack on Bud Light Backfires

Colorado Congresswoman Lauren Boebert has been criticized online for using an image of fallen U.S. soldier Pat Tillman to attack Bud Light.

For several days, Republicans have called for a boycott of Bud Light after the company sent transgender social media influencer, Dylan Mulvaney, a pack of commemorative beer cans featuring her face to celebrate the one-year anniversary of her coming out as transgender.

Mulvaney posted a video of the Bud Light beers to her Instagram page, which soon prompted a surge of right-wing outrage amid already inflamed tensions around transgender rights in the United States.

On Monday, Boebert tweeted an image of a Bud Light can depicting Tillman, an NFL player for the Arizona Cardinals who enlisted in the U.S. Army in 2002 and was killed by friendly fire while serving in Afghanistan in April 2004.

The image was captioned: "Hey Bud Light, here's the one American wanted!"

A number of social media users have since pointed out that Tillman may not be the conservative hero that Boebert is implying he was, and that his views were in direct conflict with some factions of the Republican Party.

Before his death in 2004, Tillman, who joined the U.S. Army in the wake of the September 11 terror attacks, frequently spoke out against the Iraq War, reportedly calling the invasion and occupation "f*****g illegal." Tillman even made "loose plans" to meet with liberal academic and intellectual Noam Chomsky, The Intercept reported in 2017.

Tillman's coach in college, Lyle Setencich, told The Athletic in 2017 that Tillman had asked him in the 1990s whether he would have gay players on the team at Arizona State University. He replied "Good" when Setencich said he would.

"The irony is Pat Tillman probably would have fully supported Bud's decision," tweeted entrepreneur Jake Wood in response to Boebert's tweet. "That's what these idiots don't understand about him when they invoke him."

"My guess is Boebert doesn't even know this is Pat Tillman, a leftist killed by friendly fire. I suspect she chose the image just for the jaw, the imaginary militant eroticism of fascism," author Jeff Sharlet tweeted while sharing Boebert's post.

Ryan Shead, a veteran and former Democrat Arizona state representative candidate, wrote: "Of course Lauren Boebert doesn't know that Pat Tillman was an atheist who didn't want to be the military's poster boy....he was also shot in the head 3 times by friendly fire. These donuts need to stop setting their political soapbox up on the caskets of American soldiers, especially when they don't know their story."

Newsweek reached out to Boebert's office via email for comment.

The U.S. Army originally reported that Tillman was killed by enemy fire in the province of Khost on April 22, 2004. Despite knowing within hours Tillman was not killed by enemy fire, it was not weeks later that the soldier's family was made aware by the Pentagon that Tillman was accidentally shot and killed by his fellow Army Rangers.

Lieutenant General Philip R. Kensinger Jr. was censured in 2007 over the mishandling of Tillman's death, but the army denied suggestions of a cover-up.

In 2017, Tillman's widow, Marie Tillman released a statement urging people not to use the soldier's death for political gain. The statement was issued after then-President Donald Trump retweeted a video that used Tillman's name and face amid right-wing anger over NFL players kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality against Black people.

"As a football player and soldier, Pat inspired countless Americans to unify," Marie Tillman wrote in a statement to CNN.

"Pat's service, along with that of every man and woman's service, should never be politicized in a way that divides us. We are too great of a country for that. Those that serve fight for the American ideals of freedom, justice and democracy. They and their families know the cost of that fight. I know the very personal costs in a way I feel acutely every day."