Conservative beer brand plans 'Frat Boy Summer' event celebrating college students who defended American flag
FIRST ON FOX: The conservative, "woke-free" beer company that launched last year hoping to rival Bud Light will host an event Tuesday at a University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill fraternity house to celebrate the actions of the students who defended the American flag from anti-Israel protesters on campus earlier this week.
Dubbed the "Frat Boy Summer Kickoff," the event will be held at the Kappa Alpha Order fraternity house and will be hosted by the Ultra Right Beer Company.
"We're trying to get this very organic, just a good old-fashioned, frat row, beer party," said Seth Weathers, CEO of Ultra Right Beer Company, told Fox News Digital. "I love what the kids did, obviously, protecting the flag."
"I love the idea of just continuing to encourage them about what they did so that that will encourage, you know, other kids in college and everywhere else to know they did the right thing," he added.
UNC FRAT BROTHERS WHO DEFENDED US FLAG SPEAK OUT: 'DEEPLY IMPORTANT TO US'
Ultra Right Beer Company will be giving away free beer to those in attendance for what Weathers believes will turn into a "really good event" that "multiple fraternities" and Old Row, a Barstool Sports subsidiary, are involved with.
"We're doing free beer," he said. "We're making it really simple — show up, you got free beer. We're bringing half a tractor trailer load of beer for this thing just in anticipation of the kind of crowd it sounds like we're going to have."
Multiple fraternity brothers at UNC Chapel Hill garnered praise earlier this week after they were photographed hoisting an American flag that had been removed once and replaced with a Palestinian flag on the university's quad. Their decision to step in came as anti-Israel agitators attempted to take down the American flag for a second time after UNC Chancellor Lee Roberts responded with law enforcement officers to return the American flag to its place.
The flag had been flying at half-staff after four Charlotte officers were killed in the line of duty Monday.
Weathers said the event is a "pro-America celebration in celebration of these kids and what they did in encouraging more to do the same."
"Our brand's all about that. We're all about patriotism, and we're all about people boldly showing their patriotism and their beliefs. And when you see kids doing it, we're excited about that," he said.
Several Republican lawmakers have praised the fraternity brothers for stepping in and refusing to allow the removal of the American flag from its campus, including Rep. Pat Fallon, R-Texas, who praised them for displaying "extreme courage" and "deep patriotism."
The fraternity brothers defended the flag for over an hour until police were able to clear the protest and safely place it back on the flagpole. All the while, the frat brothers experienced profanity and rude gestures from protesters, along with water, bottles and rocks being thrown at them.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre remarked this week that the students' actions were "admirable."
A GoFundMe page was created to throw the fraternity brothers a "rager" for their decision to defend the flag on campus and raised more than $500,000, as of Saturday.
"These kids are going to be pulled a million directions with everyone trying to get a hold of their GoFundMe money," Weather said. "We wanted to do something organic for them to encourage more of the patriotism we saw on campus last week."
Ultra Right Beer Company launched in April 2023 as a rival to Bud Light following its partnership with transgender activist Dylan Mulvaney, which ruffled the feathers of conservatives around the country who had long supported the beer giant.
Fox News' Audrey Conklin and Alexander Hall contributed to this report.