Cycling through political circles on and off Capitol Hill is the possibility that President Joe Biden could benefit from an endorsement from Taylor Swift, who has become a megastar on the stage and in the world of sports and political commentary.
Biden’s team is discussing opportunities for celebrities to promote the president on social media platforms such as TikTok and Instagram, and Swift is its main target. Any post or effort from Swift to fundraise on Biden’s behalf could lead to millions of dollars funneling into the campaign.
The campaign has seen this film before, as Swift has engaged in politics in recent years after remaining virtually silent on the divisive topics that can determine elections. More often than not, Swift has thrown her support behind Democrats.
Here is a timeline of Swift’s political involvement and how a possible 2024 endorsement could boost Biden’s chances of winning reelection this November.
2018
The Midnights artist mostly stayed out of political conversations until 2018, when she posted a March For Our Lives photo on her Instagram page and condemned the rise in school shootings and gun violence following the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 dead and at least 17 injured.
“No one should have to go to school in fear of gun violence,” Swift wrote on March 23, 2018. “Or to a nightclub. Or to a concert. Or to a movie theater. Or to their place of worship. I’ve made a donation to show my support for the students for the March For Our Lives campaign, for everyone affected by these tragedies, and to support gun reform.”
Ahead of the 2018 midterm elections, Swift endorsed her first Democratic candidates in October: Phil Bredesen for Senate and Jim Cooper for the House of Representatives from her home state of Tennessee. She also knocked now-Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), who defeated Bredesen in the general election. Cooper won reelection that year.
“In the past I’ve been reluctant to publicly voice my political opinions, but due to several events in my life and in the world in the past two years, I feel very differently about that now,” she wrote in an Instagram post. “I always have and always will cast my vote based on which candidate will protect and fight for the human rights I believe we all deserve in this country.
“I cannot vote for someone who will not be willing to fight for dignity for ALL Americans, no matter their skin color, gender or who they love,” she added.
2019
The Lover star vocally supported the Equality Act, and in 2019, she began Pride Month by writing an open letter to then-Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) encouraging him to vote in favor of the bill.
She also created a petition on change.org to urge the Senate to pass the Equality Act.
“While there’s no information yet as to when the Equality Act will go before the Senate for a vote, we do know this: Politicians need votes to stay in office,” Swift said in a release posted to X, called Twitter at the time. “Votes come from the people. Pressure from massive amounts of people is a major way to push politicians towards positive change.”
She also included the letter she wrote to Alexander in her post, pointing to his support of a resolution honoring the ratification of the 19th Amendment.
“This was a positive step 100 years ago and I hope we can all continue to put aside partisan affiliations when it comes to matters of basic human rights,” Swift wrote, referring to the amendment.
Swift took aim at then-President Donald Trump and Republicans in her letter, stating the president cannot say he “supports equal treatment of all” but then call the Equality Act “filled with poison pills that threaten to undermine parental and conscience rights.”
“Please, please think about the lives you could change for the better if you were to vote to support the Equality Act in the Senate and prohibit this harsh and unfair discrimination,” the pop star wrote to Alexander. “I, for one, would be immensely grateful.”
The Senate did not act on the bill during the 116th Congress, which would likely have received a veto from Trump if it arrived at his desk.
Swift made a major political statement on June 17, 2019, with the release of her music video “You Need To Calm Down,” featuring several prominent LGBT figures and celebrities such as Ellen DeGeneres, Hayley Kiyoko, Todrick Hall, Adam Lambert, and more.
The song includes several pointed lyrics at conservatives and anti-LGBT activists: “You are somebody that we don’t know / But you’re comin’ at my friends like a missile / Why are you mad? / When you could be GLAAD?” and “Shade never made anybody less gay.”
At the end of the video, Swift asks people to sign the change.org petition for the Equality Act.
Later in August, she won “Video of the Year” at the Video Music Awards and called out the White House in her acceptance speech.
“You voting for this video means that you want a world where we are all treated equally under the law regardless of who we love — regardless of how we identify,” Swift said. “At the end of this video, there was a petition and there still is a petition for the Equality Act, which basically just says we all deserve equal rights under the law. I want to thank everyone who signed that petition because it now has a half a million signatures, which is five times the amount that it would need to warrant a response from the White House.”
In a rare interview where she expressed her political views, Swift told the Guardian that Trump’s presidency is an “autocracy.”
“We’re a democracy — at least, we’re supposed to be — where you’re allowed to disagree, dissent, debate,” she said.
She also confirmed in the interview that she is staunchly pro-abortion rights and would have endorsed Hillary Clinton in 2016 if she did speak up, explaining she was going through personal matters that year.
2020
A moment of politics in Swift’s Miss Americana Netflix documentary was widely shared that year and continues to be pushed out on social media platforms. During the documentary, the footage shows the pop star explaining her regret about staying out of national politics in 2016 and how it motivated her to speak up about her bad blood with Trump and Blackburn now.
“I can’t see another commercial [with] her disguising these policies behind the words ‘Tennessee Christian values,’” the singer said in the film, referring to Blackburn, who she called a “flagrant enemy of feminism and gay rights” in a Variety issue. “I live in Tennessee. I am Christian. That’s not what we stand for.”
She fought back tears in the documentary when her father expressed concern for her well-being by expressing her political stance, saying that she stayed silent in 2016, “but I can’t change that.”
“I need to be on the right side of history,” she said.
Swift endorsed Biden in 2020, writing to Trump in a tweet following his post on the George Floyd protests that included the inflammatory phrase, “When the looting starts, the shooting starts.”
“After stoking the fires of white supremacy and racism your entire presidency, you have the nerve to feign moral superiority before threatening violence?” she posted. “‘When the looting starts the shooting starts’??? We will vote you out in November. @realdonaldtrump”
Looking ahead to 2024
After Biden’s presidential victory in November 2020, Swift has continued her political activism. A single post on Instagram from the superstar last September led to 35,000 new voter registrations. Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA), a rising star in the Democratic Party, encouraged her to engage with the Biden campaign, calling the post “profoundly powerful.”
Biden’s campaign is seeking an endorsement from Swift, assuming it could motivate young voters to head to the polls. A Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll released Monday found that nearly 20% of voters, mostly 35 and younger, said they are likely to vote for a candidate Swift endorses. While that percentage may not have such an effect on a non-competitive race, the 2024 general election is likely to be a neck-and-neck contest between Biden and Trump, coming down to a handful of votes — so Swift’s influence over young voters could push one candidate over the finish line.
Swift has been thrust into the spotlight most recently due to her relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, causing some hardcore football enthusiasts and conservatives to complain about her appearances at the games and the coverage she receives from the NFL, claiming that the relationship is a publicity stunt or at the very least, disrupts the sport.
Most recently, some hard-line conservatives have raised conspiracy theories, with no merit, that Swift is a government psyop planted by the Pentagon to aid Democrats in winning the 2024 elections. A Fox News commentator recently accused Swift of misunderstanding Republican values and being misguided on Biden’s policies, ultimately warning her against endorsing him. Former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy posted on X questioning whether the system is rigged to give Swift and Kelce’s relationship media coverage ahead of a Biden endorsement.
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Given her popularity with young and female voters, two important voting blocs that historically lean more liberal, Trump’s campaign may have cause for concern if the election comes down to the wire. The former president has bragged that he is more popular than Swift, but The View hosts warned Republicans that they should be “a little bit afraid” of the political influence Swift wields.
“What are you doing?” co-host Whoopi Goldberg asked Republicans. “I’m going to ask that side: What are you doing for younger voters? We know why young people are upset, but what are you going to do? Y’all are making so much stink about Taylor Swift because you don’t know what to do.”
