PersonLETTER FROM WASHINGTON
If Taylor Swift were a verb, Republicans would be using it in every possible tense. If she were a perfume, it would be called "Obsession." In the American right's drift, the 34-year-old pop singer represents a singular kind of disturbance. Especially since she made the cover of the American weekly magazine Time as the 2023 Person of the Year, confirming her unrivaled status. Her words are carefully studied, her company spied on, her outfits imitated. Swift is an artist whose voice carries far beyond her own repertoire.
She long stayed away from the political stage to avoid alienating any segment of her audience. But in 2018, she began to speak out in defense of sexual and racial minorities in her home state of Tennessee. In 2020, Swift expressed her support for the Biden-Harris ticket. "Under their leadership, I believe America has a chance to start the healing process it so desperately needs," she explained. In late June 2022, the singer reacted strongly to the Supreme Court's elimination of abortion as a constitutional right. "I'm absolutely terrified that this is where we are," she wrote on Twitter to her 94.9 million followers. But apart from this periodic political advocacy, Swift has built her career on not offending any group.
As the country looks set for a rematch between Joe Biden and his predecessor, the singer has become more popular and influential than ever. Politics are far from being central to her life. She entertains and inspires tens of millions of "Swifties." Her fans are almost equally male and female, 55% Democrats, three-quarters white and more than half of them live in the suburbs where the next presidential election could be decided, according to a Morning Consult poll conducted in March 2023.
The star's Eras Tour has been an unbelievable success that even caused the online ticketing platform Ticketmaster to implode at its launch. In September, Swift called on her fans on her Instagram account – followed by 280 million users – to register to vote, prompting an immediate influx of 35,000 new young voters. Her romance with Travis Kelce, one of the star players of the Kansas City Chiefs American football team, captivated the entire tabloid and mainstream press.
On January 28, Swift walked onto the field of the Baltimore, Maryland, stadium with her boyfriend, overjoyed, and kissed him in front of the cameras. The Chiefs had just secured their spot in the Super Bowl, which will pit them against the San Francisco 49ers on February 11. While the pictures of this cosmic love had the star's fans hyperventilating, the MAGA (Make America Great Again) crowd stuck to its fundamentals: Several similar versions have been floating around: fake couple, sports manipulation and rigged presidential election. "What's happening with Taylor Swift is not organic," argued veteran Donald Trump adviser Stephen Miller on X in early December. "Is Taylor Swift a Pentagon asset?" asked a Fox News banner on January 9, while host Jesse Watters wondered who had asked the singer to tell young people to vote.
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