The Fourth of July will look quite different this year as Joey Chestnut won't be competing in the 2024 Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest. Chestnut was banned by Major League Eating, the organizers of the annual hot dog eating contest, for his endorsement deal with Impossible Foods.

For the first time since Chestnut was banned, the competitive eater broke his silence in an interview with Sports Illustrated's Emma Baccellieri.

Chestnut claimed Major League Eating altered the terms of his agreement in regard to endorsing other products. The 40-year-old stated he thought it was too close to the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest to make any changes.

"Everything with Impossible was perfectly fine by all my previous agreements," Chestnut told Sports Illustrated. "They changed terms and conditions [around] exclusivity. And it's not the first time they've changed some things, but it's the first time they've really changed things after the fact, and I had to say, 'Hey, it's too late, I've already started working with this brand.' This was never an issue in the past. And they tried to dance around it -- they changed a lot of terms, and then they escalated things to a degree they didn't imagine when they started leaking information and telling people I was banned and that I turned vegan, which clearly isn't the case."

The two men running this dispute from the other side are George and Richard Shea, two brothers who run MLE. Chestnut claimed they both messaged him after the ban saying, "pretty much, that they're sorry it got ugly."

Chestnut definitely won't be competing Thursday, marking the first time since 2004 he won't be participating in the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest. However, Chestnut is keeping the door open to potentially returning to the annual contest in the future.

"I don't think the Shea brothers are bad people," Chestnut said. "I'm not burning any bridges. And I love it -- I love the Fourth of July and that contest. I'm always willing to try. I don't hold grudges. So nothing is out of the question."

While Chestnut won't be competing at Coney Island, he will still be doing some competitive eating Thursday. He'll be competing against a group of soldiers in a five-minute hot dog eating contest at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.

Chestnut will also be facing his former rival, Takeru Kobayashi, in "Chestnut vs. Kobayashi: Unfinished Beef," a hot dog eating contest airing live on Netflix on Labor Day weekend.