Are Swifties starting to believe they belong with Donald Trump? Or is that something the presidential candidate devised in his wildest dreams? It may be a little bit of both.
Category
✨
PeopleTranscript
00:00Are Swifties starting to believe they belong with Donald Trump, or is that something the
00:05presidential candidate devised in his wildest dreams? It may be a little bit of both.
00:10On August 18th, the Republican nominee for president posted a brief message on his own
00:14social media platform, Truth Social. In an uncharacteristically brief post, Trump simply
00:19wrote,
00:20"'I accept' along with a collage of photos of Taylor Swift fans, seemingly in shirts
00:24and various other merchandise, stamped with messages of support for the businessman-turned-politician.
00:29Although she hasn't said much this election cycle, Swift has been no wallflower when it
00:33comes to her apparent disdain for Trump in past years. In 2020, the singer and songwriter
00:38pledged her support to the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris campaign. She also tweeted directly
00:43at the then-sitting president following his remarks regarding the Black Lives Matter protests
00:47in Minnesota.
00:48"'When there's looting, people get shot and they die.'"
00:54Swift wrote,
00:55After stoking the fires of white supremacy and racism your entire presidency, you have
01:00the nerve to feign moral superiority before threatening violence? When the looting starts,
01:05the shooting starts? We will vote you out in November."
01:08Now, it appears Trump's boasting about the support from Swifties may have gone a step
01:12too far. Plenty of Swift's fans are telling the former president he needs to calm down,
01:17claiming that he generated the images on his post with AI. One wrote on ex-formerly Twitter,
01:23Of course Trump is posting AI and Photoshopped pics memes about Swifties and Taylor Swift
01:28supporting him. Another person wrote, in part,
01:31"'The man is melting down in real time. Now he is posting AI-generated fake pics of non-existent
01:36Swifties for Trump with I accept.'"
01:39Newsweek has verified that some of the images Trump posted were, indeed, generated via artificial
01:44intelligence, including one of Swift in an Uncle Sam costume with the caption,
01:48"'Taylor wants you to vote for Donald Trump.'"
01:51Another screenshot Trump shared within the post is clearly emblazoned with the word,
01:55"'satire'' on it. It's unknown whether or not Trump realized that some of the photos
01:59were not real when he shared them. They mostly seemed to be generated by one Twitter user.
02:04Some of Trump's fervent supporters quickly jumped on the bandwagon, also touting the
02:07collage of photos featuring the Swifties' supposed seal of approval. One person even
02:12reached out to the Twittersphere asking for help to determine, quote, "'whether Trump's
02:16seemingly AI-generated Swifties for Trump images could be implicated by the Elvis Act,
02:21also known as the Ensuring Likeness, Voice, and Image Security Act. The Tennessee law
02:25is meant to prohibit the unauthorized use of someone's likeness through artificial intelligence.'"
02:30Though some of the images in Trump's truth social post are AI-generated, at least one
02:35is of a real person. Newsweek found that one of the photos is of self-professed Swifty
02:39and unapologetic Trump supporter Jenna Peewee-Warchick. She proved it in a video released on August
02:4517th.
02:46I think this movement is super awesome, but also super important because it's no secret
02:51that millions of young female voters consider themselves Swifties."
02:55She added that she doesn't want young women to have to choose between loving Swift and
02:58supporting conservative candidates in the voting booth.
03:01Several other diehard Swifties have also been making waves on TikTok as they have proudly
03:05declared their support for Trump. One garnered her own, look-what-you-made-me-do moment when
03:10she posted a video while wearing her Heiress Tour sweatshirt and a hot pink Make America
03:14Great Again hat at the same time. She wrote in the caption,
03:17"'Swifties' and MAGA supporters unite."
03:20Time will tell whether it's a love story or she's told they're never, ever, ever getting
03:24together.