While factions of the Republican Party dare to publicly attack global superstar Taylor Swift after she celebrated boyfriend Travis Kelce getting to next month’s Super Bowl, Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) is apparently not partaking.
Appearing on Newsmax’s Wake Up America on Wednesday, Blackburn was asked about Swift’s opposition to her candidacy in 2018. In her Netflix documentary Miss Americana, Swift derided the far-right senator as “Trump in a wig” and criticized her opposition to legislation aimed at protecting women's rights.
Host Rob Finnerty tried to get Blackburn to weigh in on Swift’s politics after he cited a Newsweek poll that indicated 18 percent of voters would back a Swift-supported candidate. Blackburn, however, used the opportunity to praise the Nashville titan.
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“Taylor Swift is really a popular, very talented young woman,” Blackburn said. “She has built quite an empire. I am so, so thrilled that she has chosen to base that in Nashville. She is considered to be an influencer. I think when it comes to elections, people look at the issues that are important to them and they make their decisions.”
Blackburn then pivoted to the GOP’s issues with President Biden’s border policy, but co-host Sharla McBride stayed focused on Swift. “Did it bother you?” McBride pressed. “Do her comments bother you at all when she said ‘Trump in a wig’?”
Blackburn resisted the bait. “I just shake it off,” she quipped.
During an interview with Fox News in October 2018, Blackburn disputed Swift’s characterization of her beliefs but shied away from directly criticizing the Grammy-winning artist. In 2020, Blackburn even praised Swift’s artistry and regarded their differences as simple policy disputes ahead of the debut of the popstar’s documentary.
“Taylor is an exceptionally gifted artist and songwriter, and Nashville is fortunate to be the center of her creative universe,” Blackburn told Variety in a 2020 statement. “While there are policy issues on which we may always disagree, we do agree on the need to throw the entertainment community’s collective influence behind legislation protecting songwriters, musicians, and artists from censorship, copyright theft, and profiteering.”
Her most explicit criticism of Swift came in July 2021, when she told Breitbart: “Taylor Swift came after me in my 2018 campaign. But Taylor Swift would be the first victim of that… When you look at Marxist socialistic societies, they do not allow women to dress or sing or be on stage or to entertain or the type of music she would have. They don’t allow protection of private intellectual property rights.”
Blackburn’s comments follow a MAGA freakout over the singer after she celebrated Kelce’s win with the Kansas City Chiefs against the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday, with some regarding her as the product of a psychological manipulation attempt to eventually influence voters to vote for a Democrat during the 2024 election. That was partially propelled by failed presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy in an X post on Monday.
Swift, like Blackburn, has opted not to engage.
