Taylor Swift, one of the music industry’s biggest stars, endorsed Kamala Harris for president shortly after the Presidential debate ended on Tuesday night.
“As a voter, I make sure to watch and read everything I can,” Swift wrote on Instagram to her 283 million followers late on Tuesday, adding: “I will be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in the 2024 presidential election.
“I think she is a steady-handed, gifted leader and I believe we can accomplish so much more in this country if we are led by calm and not chaos,” Swift wrote in an Instagram post, which included a link to a voter registration website.
As the Associated Press notes, Swift has a dedicated following among young women, a key demographic in the November election, and her latest tour has generated more than $1 billion in ticket sales. In a half hour, the post received more than 2.3 million likes.
She included a picture of herself holding her cat Benjamin Button, and she signed the message “Childless Cat Lady.” The remark is a reference to three-year-old comments made by JD Vance, Donald Trump’s running mate, about women without children not having an equal stake in the country’s future.
Swift wrote that her endorsement was partially prompted by Trump’s decision to post AI-generated pictures suggesting that she had endorsed him. One showed Swift dressed as Uncle Sam, and the text said “Taylor wants YOU to VOTE for DONALD TRUMP.”
Trump’s posts “brought me to the conclusion that I need to be very transparent about my actual plans for this election as a voter,” Swift wrote. She added that “I’ve done my research, and I’ve made my choice.”
The Trump campaign dismissed Swift’s endorsement
“This is further evidence that the Democrat Party has unfortunately become a party of the wealthy elites,” said spokesperson of the Trump campaign Karoline Leavitt.
“There’s many Swifties for Trump out there in America,” she said, herself included.
Swift’s endorsement was not exactly a surprise. In 2020, she supported President Joe Biden, and she cheered for Harris in her debate against then-Vice President Mike Pence. She also was openly critical of Trump, saying he had stoked “the fires of white supremacy and racism.”
Swift is a popular figure nationwide, but especially among Democrats. As the Associated Press notes, an October 2023 Fox News poll found that 55 percent of voters overall, including 68 percent of Democrats, said they had a favorable view of Swift.
Republicans were divided, with 43 percent having a favorable opinion and 45 percent an unfavorable one.
Taylor Swift has broken several records in recent years, with the Eras Tour now the highest-grossing concert film of all time, and the 2024 Grammy Awards earlier this year seeing the artist announce her 11th album, The Tortured Poets Department, which was released on April 19.