Minocqua Brewing Company owner Kirk Bangstad, who offered free beer in the event of President Donald Trump’s death, announced his bid for Wisconsin governor on Sunday.
“I’m running for Governor because I believe Wisconsin needs a battle-hardened fighter to join the rest of America to save our Democracy from Trump’s regime, and that person doesn’t exist in the crowded field of Democrats currently running in Wisconsin’s Gubernatorial primary,” Bangstad wrote in a Substack post on Sunday.
Bangstad’s announcement came a little over a week after his brewery advertised free beer in the event of Trump’s death. The Facebook comments came after news of shots being fired at the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner, where Trump and several of his Cabinet members attended.
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“Well, we almost got #freebeerday. Either a brother or sister in the Resistance needs to work on their marksmanship or he faked another assassination to get a positive news cycle,” the post said. “We’ll never know. Regardless, we stand at the ready to pour free beer the day it happens.”
The post led to Bangstad and his company being investigated by the FBI and Secret Service and disavowed by members of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, according to Bangstad.
“The messaging mistake [State Rep. Francesca] Hong made, as well as [gubernatorial candidate Mandela] Barnes and the rest of the Corporate Democrats, spilled progressive blood into the water that created a feeding frenzy against me, my fiancé, and my company. Trump’s propaganda machine and the corporate media that continuously fails America with its cancerous ‘bothside-ism,’ came after me with full force; and that led to me being interrogated and intimidated by the FBI and the Secret Service,” Bangstad wrote.
He continued, “After those two agents left my taproom on Thursday night, I told my lawyer Fred that I was going to run for Governor. Since I couldn’t trust the Democratic Party to have my back nor the current slate of gubernatorial candidates—and because I have a social media reach that dwarfs them all—I might as well stand up for myself and the rest of the working class, who I’ve been standing up for with my loud voice for the last 6 years.”
To qualify for the November election, Bangstad is seeking 2000 signatures by June 1.
Reached for comment, Bangstad responded by harshly criticizing Fox News Digital, also saying, “I’d tell you that the world is almost as excited about me running for governor as they are about #freebeerday.”
Bangstad previously ran for Congress in 2015 and for the Wisconsin state assembly in 2020. Since then, he has also formed the Minocqua Brewing Company SuperPAC, which “aims to remove Republican federal and state elected officials who perpetuated the election lies that caused the Insurrection of January 6, 2021, and whose downplaying of the seriousness of COVID-19 caused so many unnecessary deaths in our country,” according to the company website.
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The Minocqua Brewing Company is largely known for selling specialty-branded beers based on political trends and figures such as “Resistance Pilsner” and “Tammy Shandy,” after Wisconsin Sen. Tammy Baldwin.
This article has been updated to include Bangstad’s comment.
