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Taylor Swift slams Donald Trump for ‘stoking the fires of white supremacy and racism’

The West Australian
Taylor Swift performs at Amazon Music's Prime Day concert in New York. Swift will be honored with the award for artist of the decade at this year's American Music Awards. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)
Camera IconTaylor Swift performs at Amazon Music's Prime Day concert in New York. Swift will be honored with the award for artist of the decade at this year's American Music Awards. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File) Credit: Evan Agostini/Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, Evan Agostini

Taylor Swift has maintained an apolitical stance throughout most of her career, that is until the singer became one of the most prominent voices to slam Donald Trump on Twitter for “stoking the fires of white supremacy and racism.”

Following the peaceful protests that unfolded into unrest in Minneapolis over George Floyd’s death at the knee of a police officer, the singer has expressed her disgust to her more than 86 million Twitter followers.

“After stoking the fires of white supremacy and racism your entire presidency, you have the nerve to feign moral superiority before threatening violence,” she wrote.

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“”When the looting starts the shooting starts’??? We will vote you out in November,” she wrote and tagged President Trump.

Her tweet is was response to Trump’s message to shoot the protesters fighting for racial justice.

Within little more than an hour the post had been retweeted 100,000 times and has now reached more than 300,000 retweets and 1.4 million likes.

Many have praised Swift for speaking out about white supremacy and while this is not reason enough to applaud, with her significant fan based many of which are young white women, she does have considerable influence through her voice.

Protests continued following the death of George Floyd, who died after being restrained by Minneapolis police officers on Memorial Day.
Camera IconProtests continued following the death of George Floyd, who died after being restrained by Minneapolis police officers on Memorial Day. Credit: Alyssa Pointer/AP

Swift was previously criticised for remaining silent during the 2016 election when other celebrities endorsed Hilary Clinton.

Although, in 2018 she started to shift her political status by speaking out about gun violence and supporting LGBTQI rights though her You Need to Calm Down video.

Her 2020 documentary Miss Americana saw her address her vague political voice.

“I just figure I’m a 22-year-old singer. I don’t know if people really wanna hear my political views. I think they just kind of want to hear me sing songs about breakups and feelings,” Swift said.

“Part of the fabric of being a country artist is don’t force your politics on people,”she said referring to fellow country singers the Dixie Chicks after they received backlash for criticising then President George W. Bush in 2003.

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