Lying or making erroneous statements is a time-honored tradition for politicians on the campaign trail, but a member of Congress who happens to be a candidate for the New Jersey governorship is taking his tall tales a step further and taking his misrepresentations to Photoshop.
Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) is such a fan of Bruce Springsteen that he walked out to his campaign announcement to “Glory Days.” However, to prove himself a true super-fan of “The Boss,” the aspiring governor had to go a step further: share his 2024 Spotify Wrapped, which listed his most listened-to songs for the year. It was a clean sweep for Springsteen, with his songs earning the top five spots on the list.
However, there was one problem. It wasn’t actually Gottheimer’s Spotify Wrapped. It was a Photoshopped version of it that listed the five Springsteen songs as his most listened-to songs. Enterprising reporters noted that the spacing between the songs on the list was unusual, and the font used in the congressman’s list also differed from the one used by Spotify.
Confronted with the evidence, Gottheimer came clean. According to NJ Advance Media, the wannabe governor confirmed that his Photoshopped list was not a genuine screenshot of his Spotify Wrapped because he shares his account with his children, who muddied what would have been a clean sweep for Springsteen with Taylor Swift.
“This would be my Spotify Wrapped if I didn’t share my account with my 12 and 15-year-old kids,” he said. “While it’s Springsteen all day for me — don’t get me wrong, I still love listening to Taylor Swift!”
As one of New Jersey’s favorite native sons, Springsteen enjoys a unique place of honor in Garden State culture. So, it is not hard to see why Gottheimer sought to identify himself as a fan. Seriously, though, how many people was he going to convince to vote for him simply by sharing that Springsteen is his favorite artist?
The congressman is hardly the first politician to pull a stunt like this, and he won’t be the last, but honestly, the risks of being exposed as a phony for what was a pretty obvious Photoshop job were much higher than any benefit that would be gained from convincing working-class New Jerseyans that, despite his Ivy League education and years in politics, he is still in touch with his roots.
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One of the many diagnoses of the Democratic Party’s failure to connect with voters in this recent election is the fact that they do not act like normal people. Normal people don’t Photoshop fake Spotify lists to share on social media, even if their Spotify Wrapped is dominated by their child’s obsession with Swift. After all, she is the most popular pop singer in the world, and by quite a long shot.
If Gottheimer had really been riding down “Thunder Road” to live his “Glory Days,” he wouldn’t have had to convince people with a Spotify Wrapped screenshot.
