Have you heard of the "Taylor Swift effect"? These are phenomena, each more improbable than the last, that the American singer provokes due to her unrivaled popularity. The list is mind-boggling. As is the way in which she occupies terrain other than her own, without seeming to touch it. The stakes are high.
It's true that she has assets. At 34, she has released a ton of records. She is the most listened-to singer of all time and the most downloaded in the world – 228 million downloads in 24 hours of her latest record, 1989 (Taylor's Version), released in October 2023. But she's not just a voice broadcast in stations, airports and stores. Nor is she just a singer studied at Harvard and other universities (one in Melbourne is organizing a "Swiftposium" in February) a name given to doughnuts and cocktails or a curiosity: Two July 2023 concerts in Seattle caused a seismic tremor of magnitude 2.3 due to the dance steps of 144,000 people in a stadium.
All this is insignificant compared to what's at stake. Will she influence the American presidential election on November 5 by supporting Democrat Joe Biden? Long discreet about politics, she called for a vote for him in 2020, accusing Trump of "fanning the flames of white supremacism and racism."
Yet her aura has soared even higher. She was Time magazine's 2023 Person of the Year. Seventy percent of Americans adore her. After the singer called on her 279 million Instagram followers in September 2023 to go to Vote.org to register to vote, the platform recorded 35,000 registrations the same day (+23% over the norm). This clean-cut, blue-eyed blonde, who plays the simple good girl and sings both country and pop, has the perfect profile to appeal to undecided or abstentionist young voters living in the suburbs.
Hatred has gone up a notch
Swift is even more of a political asset since she recently revealed that her partner is an American football star, the white and very "country" Travis Kelce, of the Kansas City Chiefs, who will be playing in the Super Bowl on February 11, one of the most important identity events in the US. The romance has ignited the rock star's community, following her to the stadiums and mingling with a rather conservative audience.
Realizing the danger, Trump-supporting foot soldiers have been firing at Swift for the past few days, accusing her of being a Pentagon agent or practicing black magic on stage. They say her sports romance is as rigged as the February 11 game. The singer would instrumentalize it to expand her fan base, which she would then place at Biden's service. Swift being smeared by those close to Trump proves that she is becoming a presidential threat.
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