On July 10, 2023, claims began to spread on social media platforms that country singer Garth Brooks had canceled his Las Vegas residency due to low ticket sales after he said he would continue selling Bud Light at his new bar. The beer had been boycotted by conservatives because of a Bud Light marketing campaign that featured transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.
""His Nashville bar lost all its investors, the grand opening was a flop, he was ousted from next year's Country Music Awards, Toby Kieth [sic] backed out of a show with him in August, and in what was probably the greatest insult, he was booed off the stage…," a Twitter post said on July 10, 2023.
(@carsonkrow/Twitter)
The post quoted an attached article from Dunning-Kruger Times that claimed Brooks had canceled his remaining Vegas performances:
Garth Brooks Cancels His Remaining Vegas Shows: "People Stopped Coming"
Garth Brooks had no choice but to cancel the rest of his Las Vegas contract — eleven shows altogether — after ticket sales went in the toilet.
"Nobody wants to see me right now," Brooks told ALLOD Correspondent Skip Tetheludah, "I'm hoping it will pass. All I said was I'm gonna serve Bud Light at my new bar."
We also found posts repeating the claims and linking to the Dunning-Kruger post on Reddit.
The claim wasn't true. On the website's "About Us" page, Dunning-Kruger Times describes its articles as fiction:
Everything on this website is fiction. It is not a lie and it is not fake news because it is not real. If you believe that it is real, you should have your head examined. Any similarities between this site's pure fantasy and actual people, places, and events are purely coincidental and all images should be considered altered and satirical. See above if you're still having an issue with that satire thing.
In May 2023, The Associated Press reported that Brooks' Vegas residency had been extended to 2024 after tickets quickly sold out when they first went on sale in late 2022. With that, if the residency had been completely cancelled, reputable news publications would have reported what happened. We found no such articles about the "news."
We've previously fact-checked other satirical claims about Brooks that came from Dunning-Kruger Times. One we checked was about Brooks supposedly being booed offstage at the "123rd Annual Texas County Jamboree." Another satirical claim concerned Brooks canceling his new bar's grand opening.
For background, here is why we sometimes write about satire/humor.