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By Veronica Mackey
Last week mega pop star Taylor Swift endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris on Instagram after watching the Trump-Harris debate.
“She fights for the rights and causes I believe need a warrior to champion them,” Swift wrote. “I think she is a steady-handed, gifted leader and I believe we can accomplish so much more in this country if we are led by calm and not chaos.”
The endorsement came after Trump shared a fake image of Swift endorsing him in an AI-generated post last month. Trump wrote “I accept.” Swift’s real endorsement set the record straight and made it clear to her 283 million followers where her heart really was. This is not the first time the singer has made a public endorsement. In 2018, she threw her support behind two Tennessee congressional candidates whose views on LGBTQIA rights and gender equality line up with hers.
Trump’s pretentious fondness for Swift ended abruptly, with an emotionally charged post on Truth Social, saying in all caps, “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT.”
When asked what he thought about Swift’s comment, Trump’s vice-presidential running mate JD Vance said: “We admire Taylor Swift’s music, but I don’t think most Americans, whether they like her music, are fans of hers or not, are going to be influenced by a billionaire celebrity who I think is fundamentally disconnected from the interests and the problems of most Americans.”
Comedian and talk show host Jimmy Kimmel couldn’t help but point to the irony in Vance’s comment: “You mean a disconnected billionaire celebrity like your running mate Donald Trump? The one who has a skyscraper with his name on it?”
How much of an impact Swift will have on actually getting young people to voters is unclear. However, she is credited with sending 300,000 new visitors to the voter registration website Vote.gov, according to NPR.org.
Meanwhile, survivors of the horrific Sandy Hook School Shooting in 2013 as first-graders are now old enough to vote. Being personally affected by the 26 students and teachers who lost their lives, they are taking the issue of gun violence—and their voting rights—very seriously. Two of them, Grace Fischer and Emma Ehrens, met with Harris at the White House in June on National Gun Violence Awareness Day, and plan to vote for the vice president.
According to USNews.com, “Young people of color in key battleground states are significantly more likely than their white counterparts to be uncommitted to a presidential candidate – a key finding in the run-up to an election that presents voters with two major-party competitors delivering starkly different messages.”
On Sunday night, Swift appeared at the MTV Video Music Awards, urging people to register to vote while accepting her award for video of the year, which is voted on by fans. “Please register to vote for something else that’s very important,” she said, “our presidential election.”
