‘Who Would Drive That?’: Megyn Slams Jaguar for Woke Rebrand that Is Being Called Bud Light 2.0

Is Jaguar about to go the way of Bud Light? The British luxury car manufacturer sparked backlash earlier this week with its jarring new brand identity that was revealed as part of an ad featuring androgynous models.

The commercial coincided with videos resurfacing of Jaguar’s brand strategy director boasting about the company’s DEI programs and policies, which led the internet to declare the automaker is but the latest victim of “go woke, go broke.”

On Friday’s show, Megyn was joined by Dasha Nekrasova and Anna Khachiyan of Red Scare Podcast to discuss the controversial ad and what comes next for Jaguar.

The Rebrand

Jaguar released the 30-second advertisement on Tuesday titled “Copy Nothing” that has since racked up some 1.1 million views on YouTube and millions more on X. Models dressed in vibrant primary colors parade around as phrases like “create exuberant,” “live vivid,” “delete ordinary,” and “break molds”  flash on screen.

The link to the Jaguar website features models from the commercial and teases something coming on December 2 with the message “we’re here to delete ordinary. To go bold. To copy nothing.” With a goal of “championing originality,” Jaguar claims it is “collaborating with a collective of original creators across the arts,” “exploring new perspectives,” and “challenging boundaries.”

The new look comes in the wake of Jaguar’s head of brand strategy, Santino Pietrosanti, bragging at a LGBTQ+ award show in London last month that he was moving the company’s culture in a more woke, DEI-focused direction.

“We’ve established more than 15 DEI groups such as Pride, Women in Engineering, and Neurodiversity Matters,” he said. “We’ve launched major policy revisions such as ‘transitioning at work’ to drive equity and support for our communities embracing individuality as our superpower.”

The Backlash

Elon Musk reacted to the ad on X asking, “Do you sell cars?” And there was plenty more skepticism where that came from. “Don’t worry, we won’t be copying you, Jaguar,” Megyn quipped.

She shared that she once had a high opinion of the brand. “Let me just tell you something about Jaguar. When I was very young and fresh out of law school, I went to this firm Bickel & Brewer [now Brewer, Attorneys & Counselors]. It is a great firm of cut-throat litigators,” she recalled. “And when you made partner at Bickel & Brewer, you got a Jaguar… [because] there was an image… that it was sort of effortlessly cool.” 

Megyn said she no longer holds that opinion of the brand. “Now, who would drive that? I wouldn’t be caught dead driving a Jaguar right now,” she continued. “I actually just had to buy a new car because my lease expired, and I looked into Jaguar because I had a good affiliation given my years at Bickel & Brewer and these cool guys who I love… I dodged a bullet there.”

Khachiyan said it is very clear the Jaguar ad was in the works before Donald Trump won the election in what could, at least in part, be read as a referendum on wokeness. And she doesn’t think the ideology will disappear overnight. “I don’t think wokeness is over because you have to remember that it’s really, really entrenched in the cultural institutions and federal bureaucracies and those people are still running things,” she explained. “But I have a lot of hope that guys like Vivek [Ramaswamy] and Elon [Musk] will try to take care of it [with DOGE].”

Nekrasova called the rebrand “extremely out of touch and irrelevant” and said the market will have the final say. “[Wokeness] is pretty entrenched in the bureaucracy, but… people have a bottom line. People want to make money,” she said. “If the Jaguars aren’t selling, eventually… things will pivot towards… normal.”

You can check out Megyn’s full interview with Nekrasova and Khachiyan by tuning in to episode 952 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s Triumph (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.