D'Souza Announces '2000 Mules' Returning to Theaters Nationwide After Strong Sales
Conservative filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza announced Monday that his latest documentary “2000 Mules” is returning to theaters nationwide this weekend thanks to popular demand.
D’Souza explained in a video posted to social media that the original two screening dates in theaters for the movie earlier this month did not happen in the traditional way.
Rather, he, along with Salem Media Group, rented out approximately 300 theaters during which the film was shown once each of the two days.
But after “2000 Mules” took in more than $10 million in sales — between theater box office receipts and streaming — according to D’Souza, it is going back to theaters as a normal release.
Having crossed $10 million in revenue, β2000 Mulesβ is now the most successful political documentary in a decade. I should knowβitβs the most profitable and most talked-about documentary since my own β2016: Obamaβs America,β released 10 years ago in 2012
β Dinesh D’Souza (@DineshDSouza) May 12, 2022
“What happened is with the success of the movie, everyone talking about the movie, a lot of independent theaters began to call us, βHey, why canβt we have this movie in the theater?β” D’Souza recounted.
He noted that despite the “2000 Mules” being available for streaming online now, a lot of people want to see it in theaters either individually or with political groups.
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D’Souza said rather than just being in about 300 theaters for the one time showing, it will be screened throughout the day in about 400 theaters, starting Friday, May 20, at the normal ticket price, instead of the $20 price for the first special screenings.
β2000 Mules is, well, the phrase in the movie business is βgoing wide,ββ he said. βI want to make it go wide, so that everyone can see it.β
By popular demand β2000 Mulesβ is back in theaters this Friday. Plus Iβm lowering the price on streaming and DVDs so every American can see this documentary. Details here! pic.twitter.com/Ze6eSx2tuk
β Dinesh D’Souza (@DineshDSouza) May 17, 2022
It will stay in the theaters as long as there is interest in the film.
In addition to the ticket price going down, the streaming cost is also being cut from $29.99 to $19.99.
The central premise of β2000 Mulesβ is that an illegal ballot harvesting scheme took place in the key swing states of Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.
These are all states that former President Donald Trump won in 2016 but flipped to Democratic President Joe Biden in 2020.
A βmuleβ is a term used in the movie for those who were allegedly paid to repeatedly pick up batches of ballots and place them in drop boxes.
The voter integrity group True the Vote worked with DβSouza on the documentary.
True the Vote said it used cellphone geo-tracking data to identify people who went to 10 or more drop boxes and made five or more visits to non-governmental organizations working on voter turnout during the 2020 general election.
Politifact and The Associated Press have contended that the geo-tracking is not a reliable way to determine if these were actually mules delivering ballots illegally.
The threshold of 10 or more visits per mule True the Vote set was meant to eliminate any possibility the visits could have been happenstance.
To further guard against accidentally picking up people who happened to pass by drop box locations regularly, True the Vote bought cellphone data from September, October and November, showing before, during and after election season.
Only those whose cellphones placed them at drop boxes when voting was occurring were included in True the Voteβs data, the group said.
The mules followed a pattern of repeatedly going to drop box locations and back to the offices of non-governmental organizations, where ballots were allegedly collected. The movie called these locations βstash houses.β
βPings donβt lie,β True the Vote president Catherine Engelbrecht told Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk in a recent interview.
In addition to cellphone data, True the Voteβs Gregg Phillips said in β2000 Mulesβ that his group has 4 million minutes of surveillance footage from drop boxes it obtained through public records requests.
This is what stuffing the ballot box looks like pic.twitter.com/okpcKa9O4c
β Liz Harrington (@realLizUSA) April 11, 2022
The average in the five key swing states True the Vote tracked was 38 visits, with an average of five ballots per visit. βThatβs 380,000 illegal votes,β DβSouza said in β2000 Mules.β
These 380,000 votes, assuming at least a significant majority were for Biden, would have changed the outcome in Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania and thus the outcome of the 2020 general election, he further claimed in the movie.
