Did Taylor Swift's endorsement of Kamala Harris move the needle in the 2024 election?
Taylor Swift is a cultural phenomenon, specifically among young women, but the election results indicate her endorsement didn't move the needle.
After TIME magazine named Taylor Swift "person of the year" in 2023 amid her global Eras Tour, she solidified her position as a cultural phenomenon, specifically among young women. Then, when she endorsed the Harris-Walz campaign in 2024, it was deemed a devastating blow to the Trump campaign.
But President-elect Donald Trump's sweeping victory over Vice President Kamala Harris indicates that Swift's endorsement might not have had the actual impact Democrats were hoping for and that the Hollywood celebrity endorsement model might be splintering.
According to AP VoteCast, 44% of women ages 18-44 voted for Trump, while 48% of women 45 and older supported the former president, now president-elect.
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Following the presidential debate between Trump and Harris in September, Swift made her endorsement in a message to her 238 million followers on Instagram.
"I will be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in the 2024 Presidential Election," she said on Instagram. "I’m voting for @kamalaharris because she fights for the rights and causes I believe need a warrior to champion them. 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."
"I was so heartened and impressed by her selection of running mate @timwalz, who has been standing up for LGBTQ+ rights, IVF, and a woman’s right to her own body for decades," Swift added.
In a New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer and Siena College poll, which was conducted starting one day after Swift endorsed the Harris-Walz campaign, nearly 2,500 likely voters nationwide revealed that 44% have a favorable opinion of Swift, compared to 34% who have unfavorable views.
The same poll found that 47% view Trump favorably, compared to 51% who don’t. The poll shows that 70% of Democrats have a favorable view of Swift, compared to 41% of independents and just 23% of Republicans. A total of 60% of Republicans indicated that they had an unfavorable view of Swift, while only 11% of Democrats felt the same way.
A September poll found that Trump has higher favorability numbers among likely voters compared to Swift.
In her endorsement, Swift also reminded first-time voters that in order to vote, they needed to register. In an Instagram story following her endorsement, Swift shared a link directing her fans and followers to Vote.gov, which is run by the General Services Administration and the Election Assistance Commission and helps visitors register to vote in their states. The site received more than 400,000 visitors in under 24 hours.
"With love and hope, Taylor Swift Childless Cat Lady," she signed the endorsement, referencing a comment made by Vice-President Elect JD Vance in a 2021 interview in which he said "we're effectively run in this country via the Democrats, via our corporate oligarchs, by a bunch of childless cat ladies." Vance maintains the comment was a "willfully misinterpreted" and taken out of context.
Vance questioned the impact of Swift's endorsement on Fox News.
"We admire Taylor Swift's music, but I don't think most Americans, whether they like her music or are fans of hers or not, are going to be influenced by a billionaire celebrity who I think is fundamentally disconnected from the interests and the problems of most Americans," Vance said at the time.
Swift has been outspoken about her political beliefs in recent years, but had also been repeatedly criticized for not being outspoken enough, especially after Trump won in 2016.
She made her first foray into politics in 2018 when she denounced Republican Tennessee Senate candidate Marsha Blackburn and endorsed her Democratic opponent, former Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, as well as Democratic House candidate Jim Cooper. Swift's link to a nonpartisan voter registration site gave it a major boost in traffic and new registrations.
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In a scene from the behind-the-scenes 2020 Netflix documentary "Miss Americana," Swift emotionally told her parents why she planned to step into the political fray with her post against Blackburn. She also said she deeply regretted not speaking out publicly against Trump in 2016.
Swift released a pro-gay anthem, "You Need to Calm Down," for her 2019 album "Lover." The single's music video featured prominent LGBT figures and derided anti-LGBT voices as backwards and ignorant, poking fun at internet trolls who dislike her progressivism. However, she still received some backlash from some left-wing sites who said she had appropriated the issue and wasn't being a good ally to their cause.
Shortly before that single's release, Swift started a petition at Change.org and urged fans to write letters to their senators, demanding they pass the Equality Act, a Democrat-backed bill meant to ban discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
"Our country’s lack of protection for its own citizens ensures that LGBTQ people must live in fear that their lives could be turned upside down by an employer or landlord who is homophobic or transphobic. The fact that, legally, some people are completely at the mercy of the hatred and bigotry of others is disgusting and unacceptable," she wrote in the petition.
Other celebrities and Hollywood stars also endorsed the Democratic Party going into the 2024 presidential election, including Oprah Winfrey, Jennifer Lopez, George Clooney, Beyoncé, Bruce Springsteen, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Leonardo DiCaprio, Julia Roberts, Robert Downey Jr., Mark Ruffalo, Charli XCX, Meryl Street, Spike Lee and Barbra Streisand.
