New Delhi: In 2023, Taylor Swift, the multi-award-winning musical artist and that year’s Time Person of the Year, reportedly earned more money than the annual economic output of nearly 50 countries. Her Eras world tour through the year added millions in economic activity for the local economies where she performed.
However, Swift’s successes have also put her in the crosshairs of the entire ecosystem that supports and canvasses for former US president Donald Trump in his attempt to win the American presidential elections scheduled for 5 November.
Swift’s popularity even led Trump to warn her against being “disloyal” and supporting President Joe Biden in a post on his social media platform Truth Social, hours before the Super Bowl Sunday.
“I signed and was responsible for the Music Modernisation Act for Taylor Swift and all other Musical Artists. Joe Biden didn’t do anything for Taylor, and never will. There’s no way she could endorse Crooked Joe Biden (sic),” Trump said in his post.
“[Biden], the worst and most corrupt President in the History of our Country, and be disloyal to the man who made her so much money. Besides that I like her boyfriend Travis [Kelce], even though he may be a Liberal, and probably can’t stand me,” added Trump.
The Music Modernisation Act is a 2018 legislation aimed at modernising copyright-related issues for music and audio recordings in the digital streaming era.
Trump’s callout of Swift comes as the ecosystem that supports his candidacy for months has published conspiracy theories regarding the singer and her boyfriend Travis Kelce, a tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs in the National Football League (NFL).
The conspiracy theories range from calling Swift a “psychological operation” (PsyOp) by the US Department of Defence to her boyfriend being paid by pharmaceutical companies to ensure that people across the country are vaccinated.
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Trump’s ecosystem and the Taylor Swift meltdown
On 10 January, Fox News anchor Jesse Watters did a segment titled, ‘Is Taylor Swift a Pentagon PsyOp asset?’ This comes after Swift faced ire from the Trump ecosystem earlier in 2023 for calling people to register to vote.
In September 2023, Swift, in a post to her over 270 million followers on Instagram, urged them to register to vote for the 2024 elections. The website she directed her fans to — Vote.org — reported to have recorded more than 35,000 registrations after her post.
In 2020, Swift had endorsed Biden for president, willing to speak out on political issues. Her open support in the past for Democratic candidates has led to conspiracy theories sprouting across newsrooms and social media accounts supporting Trump in the US.
“Have you ever wondered why or how she [Swift] blew up like this? Well around four years ago the Pentagon [the US Department of Defence] psychological operations unit floated turning Taylor Swift into an asset during a NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organisation] meeting,” proclaimed Watters in his segment.
Watters describes the potential position for Swift as a “PsyOp” for combatting online misinformation and went on to describe other musical stars through the decades who have worked with various US presidents to buttress his unverifiable claim.
The larger claim is that Swift is part of an operation to ensure Biden’s reelection in 2024.
The Fox News segment received a rebuke from the Pentagon, with deputy Pentagon press secretary Sabrina Singh referencing one of Swift’s songs in her response saying, “as for this conspiracy theory, we are going to shake it off,” reported Politico.
In February 2024, Singh categorically denied any connection between Swift and the US Department of Defense. “Taylor Swift is not part of a DOD psychological operation. Period,” she told Politico.
Charlie Kirk, the American right-wing political activist and radio talk show host had an entire episode on his podcast ‘The Charlie Kirk Show’ on 13 January 2024, on Swift being a “Deep State Op”.
Kirk in his episode declared that the whole relationship between Swift and Kelce is a “forced” operation to “fight for democracy” by the so-called “deep-state”. His allegation is based on the fact that when Kirk visited a grocery store, every magazine had Swift on the cover, while Kelce, a football player Kirk claims is “good but not that good” is appearing in commercials across America.
Despite the official denials, the theory has evolved across the Trump-verse, especially about Kelce and Swift and the Super Bowl.
‘Rigged’ Super Bowl and other theories
In a post on social media platform X (formerly Twitter) in late January, former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy shared a conspiracy theory about the Super Bowl — one of America’s biggest sporting events — being rigged.
“I wonder who’s going to win the Super Bowl next month. And I wonder if there’s a major presidential endorsement coming from an artificially culturally propped-up couple this fall,” Ramaswamy, who dropped out of the presidential race last month, said.
He was responding to a post made by Jack Posobiec, a pro-Trump activist famous for promoting the conspiracy theory that high-ranking Democratic party officials are running a paedophilia ring out of a pizzeria in Washington D.C. The theory dubbed ‘Pizzagate’ was debunked, however, found support among the Trump ecosystem.
In his post, Posobeic wrote: “Thinking about when Taylor Swift called out the Soros family in 2019 for buying the rights to her music and then how she came out a super liberal in 2020.”
Similarly, after the Kansas City Chiefs won the Super Bowl Sunday, pro-Trump broadcaster Mike Crispi said the results of the game proved his prediction — that the game was rigged in favour of the Chiefs — right.
However, the relationship between Swift and Kelce has had a positive impact on the National Football League (NFL) in 2023. The Athletic reported that this year’s Super Bowl had 123.7 million viewers — the most-watched US programme in history.
In another report, the same publication said that Swift’s appearance at NFL games over the season and her relationship with Kelce have helped bring newer viewers to watch the game and reportedly made hundreds of millions of dollars as brand value to the Kansas City Chiefs.
The Taylor Swift “phenomenon” has led the singer to become a coveted endorsement in the 2024 presidential election. According to The New York Times, the Biden campaign has identified her as an influential figure to target for an endorsement, but so far none has been forthcoming.
The question, however, remains on the real impact of Taylor Swift’s endorsement in a presidential campaign and whether the Trump ecosystem is actually ready for it.
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
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