Norfolk Brewer Sells to Trans-Phobic "Veteran" Brewer
Another veteran owned company uses guns, camo and bigotry to sell their wares.
Here in Norfolk, Va we have a brewery about every 6 blocks, so one leaving town and another replacing it isn’t necessarily news but when local news reported that Governor Youngkin sent out a press release about one, it got my attention.
Youngkin released the statement, “Armed Forces [Brewing] recognizes that Virginia’s strategic location, business-friendly climate, and strong military and veteran presence in Hampton Roads will lead to success at its new home in the City of Norfolk, and we look forward to a successful partnership…"
13NewsNow reported that Youngkin beat O’Connor Brewing (already a controversial company) to the punch on announcing who was buying their Norfolk location. It was the very military-branding-forward company "Armed Forces Brewing.”
If a website was a person, this site would be accused of stolen valor. But that’s not the point of this article. Many companies run by veterans use that sweet sweet patriotism to pull people into their (usually) mediocre product.
The point here is that the company that garnered the endorsement of Governor Youngkin and the Virginia Delegate for Norfolk, Jackie Glass (D) is run by two openly right-wing Big Lie, COVID-denying promoting bigots.
Meet Robert O’Neill: depending on which part of the Armed Forces Brewing website you look at he’s either the director and national brand ambassador or the director of military relations. Possibly all three? Robert is a semi-regular figure on conservative outlets and wrote a book about how he killed bin laden called The Operator. He’s also a virulent trans-phobe, so much so it seems to be part of his personality.
He even got blocked by one of his favorite actors, the lefty John Cusack for his opinions on trans-people.
He also shares figures like Billboard Chris’ tweets. Billboard Chris’ entire personality and life is devoted to harassing people about his anti-trans beliefs. Chris just spoke at the Moms for Liberty Conference in Philadelphia (more on that in another article coming soon).
He also has some opinions on immigrants and also believes that communists are running our polling stations. My guess is that he means Democrats but who knows?
The story about how the company was run by bigots broke when delegate Jackie Glass, who I had emailed with many of these screenshots asking for her statement, posted a video on Instagram (apologies, can’t get this IG post to embed on substack).
There’s a dozen more that I’ve grabbed just from the last couple of months but let’s move on to the CEO of Armed Forces Brewing, Alan Beal. Beal oddly is not a veteran, something he’s upfront about but he really hammers home that pretty much everyone else in his family served.
Beal is not the outspoken bigot that Robert J O’Neill is he still shares some interesting opinions ranging from promoting the racist disinformation film 2000 Mules (something I’ve written and spoken about) to sharing the pregnant men meme to threatening people in government to sharing anti-black lives matter memes.
If you spend anytime on conservative social media all these are pretty standard meme’s that you’ll see your racist uncle share. They’re all mostly done with a wink and a shoulder shrug,”I’m not being racist, I’m just making a joke!” It’s boring, and it’s something that is also not a rarity amongst veteran social media.
Delegate Jackie Glass will be having a town hall at 5:30pm at MJs Tavern in Norfolk, VA. While she doesn’t specifically say here that it will be about this subject, her previous social media statements have said that it will be.
