Taylor Swift and the Super Bowl conspiracy theory | Power & Politics

The Super Bowl is on Sunday and this year many fans are going to have their eyes on the stands instead of the field and they’ll all be hoping to catch a glimpse of Pop Superstar Taylor Swift she is of course dating Kansas City Chief’s tight end Travis Kelce but

Swift’s potential Presence at the football event has stirred up some bad blood for the far right Swift finds herself starring as the anti-hero in a political media frenzy riddled with conspiracies we have had enough of Taylor Swift for now she shouldn’t be liberal she should be a total conservative given what given everything

The Pentagon scop unit pitched NATO on turning Taylor Swift into an asset yesterday she flew private from New York City to Baltimore yet she constantly talks about climate change so just please don’t believe everything Taylor Swift says we’re all begging you don’t get involved don’t get involved in

Politics we don’t want to see you there so some Republicans are going after Swift saying she’s part of an elaborate plan to boost Joe Biden’s chances in the 2024 US president presidential election so why is the GOP waging a war against Taylor Swift and is this effort potentially going to

Backfire on them Brian Donovan is a University of Kansas Professor who teaches a popular College call course called the sociology of Taylor Swift and Brandon valeriano is a political scientist at Sean Hall University’s School of diplomacy and they join me now gentlemen thank you so much for joining

Me I want to declare a conflict and a bias right up front that I’ll be cheering against Taylor Swift this weekend not because of anything she did but I am a San Francisco 49ers fan have been my whole life so that puts me on the wrong side of at least the game uh

On Sunday Brian and I know you’re in Kansas so I don’t know how you feel about the Chiefs but but let’s let’s start with this situation where an international pop sensation who’s suddenly been dragged not just into the Super Bowl Spotlight but the political Spotlight in the United States I mean

How did it get there I think Taylor’s been silent about her political views recently and the the W has decided to make her culture War fod I don’t think it’s going to end well for them I don’t think this is a good political strategy but the last week

They decided to Target her I think because she’s just been in the conversation so much everyone’s talking about her so they thought we’ll talk about her too so so Brandon the Republicans seem pretty worried particularly worried or at least irritated maybe they’re they’re launching some pretty out there attacks

Against Taylor Swift what do you think is fueling this this kind of reaction from the GOP and this is a politics of blame basically uh the concern is the Republican party has done horribly against young voters and Women Voters so they’re really worried about losing that demographic and Taylor Swift really

Speaks to that demographic so in some ways they’re preemptively blaming uh a possible uh person who responsible for their predicament but their predicament is of their own making basically okay so Brandon Ju Just here with you on that so if you already have a problem with young

Voters and you especially have a problem with young women why are you going after perhaps the Avatar the icon who speaks to more young women in America than anybody else what’s the upside of that it doesn’t really make sense and that’s kind of a through line for a lot

Of uh right politics in the United States right now but a lot of it strategically doesn’t make sense it doesn’t it’s not going to help it’s not going to attract any voters and if anything like I said it’s just someone that they can blame when their failures

Come home to roost Brian uh do you see this is giving Republicans someone to blame or they may be creating their own Problem by provoking the swifties because they are a loyal motivated Legion the swifties are the most intense fan base on the planet and I see this as

Political Folly they I are genuinely concerned I think that she will endorse Joe Biden and maybe make a public appearance with with him but I think attacking the most popular celebrity on Earth right now is not a winning strategy okay so Brian just to stick with you it’s not just criticizing or

There there’s conspiracy theories that she’s a government scop acting on behalf of Democrats and the Super Bowl is rigged I hope not uh to further this agenda and we even had former Republican candidate vivc ramaswami he tweeted last week he said I wonder who’s going to win

The Super bowl next month and I wonder if there’s a major presidential endorsement coming from an artificially culturally propped up couple this fall just some wild speculation over here let’s see how it ages over the next eight months what Brian what do you make of things like that I think what’s

Happening is that we’re seeing some of the discourse that we would previously find in the outer Burrows of the internet like on forchan or the farri Q andon segment creeping into the mainstream GOP and it’s uh an alarming development I believe because the qinon element uh tends toward political violence there’s a

Potential here for something that is uh very disturbing Brandon what’s your take on that in terms of this sort of conspiracy stuff being put out there by people who ran for the nomination and then it all gets Amplified in sort of that Mega Republican media ecosystem as

Well well and this is also turning the issue on its head right because a lot of this info op scop up comes from acquisition uh acis accusations of Russian influence on the American election and American influence on uh Russian influence on the position on the

War in Ukraine so uh you know and some people were suggesting the Tucker Carlson interview the other day with President Putin is the biggest information operation in history so in some ways they’re speaking to what is already they’ve already been accused to and uh that’s kind of why you’re seeing

This language this DOD language of a info scop because it’s already been in the discourse and they’ve already been accused of it from the angle of Russia so they’re just pointing right back at the at the you know at the the cultural Maloo to kind of stir up trouble so so

Brian Donovan you know Taylor Swift has she’s stuck her toe a little bit in in partisan politics to some degree like never gotten really says she regretted not endorsing Hillary Clinton in 2016 did come out for Biden in 2020 but she’s at a different level of Fame right now

And and you know in 2023 she encouraged Americans to register to vote on National registration day and tens of thousands of people you know went and followed her advice if she gets dragged into this and becomes a big Target does she have the potential to sway a state

Sway the country sway the election I mean what what is the potential for her influence here should the Republicans force her to be front and center in this campaign as popular as she is I think it’s easy to overstate how influential she’ll be the folks that are already

Going to vote for Biden might not be persuaded by a Taylor Swift endorsement I think her political power lies in her get out the vote message right I also think she has a a power through her her music challenging the sexual double standard empowering women I think if we think about politics more

Broadly than voting I think that’s really where her political power lies so so Brandon valano on that point right we’ve seen in um off cycle elections and state level elections when uh a lot abortion rights Reproductive Rights a lot of things that motivate women especially young women to vote when

Those have been front and center it’s hurt Republicans it’s cost them um certain races what do you see the potential influence of the overlap of those particular issues and and and obviously the makeup of the swifties uh in US uh politics potentially yeah and the thing is that elections are often about microt

Targeting now it’s about the minutia that you need to dive into and if Taylor Swift can increase turnout in certain areas uh Democratic turnout in certain areas if she can activate women on certain issues this is really what the GOP fears this is they’re speaking they’re giv voice to the fears that are

Deep deep deep in their hearts that the women and young voters will not come out to support uh former president Trump and we’ve seen that from polls that a recent poll was released the other day that women are going to go for Biden 65 to 35% and that’s kind of indicative of the

Current Trend and that’s what they fear you know celebrities get dragged into politics uh you know um reluctantly some cases but you know the Republicans have embraced you know uh Kevin Sorbo who was Hercules Scott beo who was Chachi Clint Eastwood you know is in there but nobody

Of the magnitude of someone like Taylor Swift at least in terms of Fame and reach are there examples where uh Brandon wor celebrity can influence an election in a big way I mean outside I guess Ronald Reagan winning in 1980 there’s not a lot of great examples

Oprah may be swung uh towards Obama at the tune of a million voters but uh he 1 by7 million voters so really it’s about the micro Dynamics like I suggested like maybe she may able to have an effect in Tennessee maybe there’s something she can do in the South but uh beyond that

Um this election is long since decided by many many people and it won’t really change much from the past election the best predictor of a future election is a past election so things might probably won’t change much you Brian Donovan did you share that analysis even with maybe

A motivation a get out the vote sort of uh effect from this sort of thing or is it just the the influence of celebrities is just limited because people vote based on other things I think it’s limited and I think that we should be careful what we wish

For when we hope that our favorite celebrity is going to endorse our favorite politician because the outcome can be un unexpected and celebrities are good at many things but often they lack that uh political polish uh they La they lack that that language of politics and activism and so they’re can be un

Unintended consequences of celebrities getting involved in politics okay that that’s a very good point and that’s what we’re going to end it on Brian Donovan Brandon valeriano thank you so much for your time guys thanks David

Pop star Taylor Swift, who is dating Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, is, according to some MAGA Republicans, part of an elaborate plan to both fix the Super Bowl and help President Joe Biden win the 2024 election. The Power & Politics panel of experts weighs in.

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