Biden trying to 'pump energy' into re-election campaign: NYT
Biden camp hoping for Taylor Swift endorsement
‘Outnumbered’ panel discusses whether Taylor Swift could choose to endorse President Biden in the upcoming election
President Biden's aides are dreaming of Taylor Swift's endorsement in the 2024 election as her fundraising appeal could be monumental for the president's campaign, according to a new report.
The New York Times reported Monday that the president's aides are hoping to lock down the endorsement of their "wildest dreams" in Swift, and his aides have floated even sending him to a stop on her record-setting concert "Eras Tour," although the report noted that idea was partly in jest.
The Times reported that one of Swift's Instagram posts from 2022 led to 35,000 new voter registrations. "Fund-raising appeals from Ms. Swift could be worth millions of dollars for Mr. Biden," the report read, as the president seeks to "pump energy" into his re-election bid. Recent polls have alarmed the Biden's backers as he is often trailing or tied with former President Trump, who is the heavy favorite to secure the Republican nomination again.
California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom said in September he hoped she would become more involved in the president's re-election campaign. Swift has openly supported Democratic candidates in recent elections, after previously facing criticism from the left about not speaking out strongly enough on progressive causes.
President Biden's aides reportedly considered sending the president to a stop on Taylor Swift's "Era's Tour." (Left: (Photo by James Devaney/GC Images), Right: Nicole Neri/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
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"Taylor Swift stands tall and unique," Newsom said. "What she was able to accomplish just in getting young people activated to consider that they have a voice and that they should have a choice in the next election, I think, is profoundly powerful."
Swift previously endorsed Biden in 2020, but has yet to officially chime in on the 2024 race, although who she would support is a foregone conclusion given her fierce criticism of former President Trump.
"The change we need most is to elect a president who recognizes that people of color deserve to feel safe and represented, that women deserve the right to choose what happens to their bodies, and that the LGBTQIA+ community deserves to be acknowledged and included," Swift told V Magazine in 2020.
The Times reported Monday, "The chatter around Swift and the potential of reaching her 279 million Instagram followers reached such intensity that the Biden team urged applicants in a job posting for a social media position not to describe their Taylor Swift strategy — the campaign had enough suggestions already."
Taylor Swift performs onstage during "Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour" at Allianz Parque on November 24, 2023 in Sao Paulo, Brazil. (Buda Mendes/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management)
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CNN's John Berman asked White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre about what Swift's support could do for the president on Monday.
"Any plans to go on tour?" he asked.
Jean-Pierre invoked the Hatch Act and said she wouldn't comment on anything related to the upcoming election.
"In my shop, in the press office shop, there are a lot of Swifties, if you will, fans of Taylor Swift. And so I’m just going to leave it there," she said, while laughing. "I’m not going to get into the president’s schedule at all from here, as it relates to the 2024 elections."
President Joe Biden at the White House on December 13, 2023 in Washington, DC. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
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As the president has started to frame the 2024 election as a choice between himself and a threat to democracy in Trump, Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C., said Biden couldn't rely on his "anti-Trump" message alone to push him to victory.
"We just can’t rely on this anti-Trump stuff because Trump’s supporters are going to turn out big, because they are emotionally tied to Trump," Clyburn told the Times. "We’ve got to get our voters emotionally tied to Biden."
Swift has reigned supreme in pop culture over the past year, with her wildly popular "Eras Tour" and romantic involvement with star Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce keeping her in the headlines.
Vivek Ramaswamy, a former GOP presidential candidate who's supporting Trump's re-election, wrote Monday that a Biden endorsement from Swift and Kelce was imminent and suggested it was tied to the upcoming Super Bowl being rigged in the Chiefs' favor.
"I wonder who’s going to win the Super Bowl next month," he wrote on X. "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 8 months."
Hanna Panreck is an associate editor at Fox News.
