At this point, if someone does not know who Taylor Swift is they officially live under a rock. In the past year, she has become what fans are calling “the most powerful person in America”, benefitting the economy as a whole with her Era’s Tour, breaking the internet with her new albums, and being the first person ever to win four “Album Of The Year” Grammy’s. She is rising to top-tier fame with integrity, kindness and authenticity, while inspiring young girls worldwide to shine in their own way. Although, not everyone sees Swift as innocent as most believe she is. In the past two months, members of the Republican party have started the “Anti-Taylor” movement in response to her being open about her political views and support for the Democratic party.

The movement arose in popularity when Swift started dating NFL star Travis Kelce. Suddenly football games became extremely exciting to watch for Swift fans, and simply annoying to watch for true football fans. Major rage surfaced over the fact that camera people cut the screen to Swift whenever they had a chance, which resulted in Chiefs fans being angry at missing those five-second moments where they could not see the field anymore. This escalated to a spiral of conspiracy theories starting about how the relationship between Kelce and Swift was a stunt to give Swift an even larger platform to possibly promote her political views and endorse Biden for the 2024 presidential election.

In an article from the Washington Post written by reporter Mariana Alfero, it stated that on Mon, Jan. 29, Fox News host Jeanine Pirro sent a message to Swift saying, “Don’t get involved in politics; we don’t want to see you there,” while looking straight at the camera.

That is one of many messages that Republicans have been throwing at Swift and her fans. The most recent chant that has surfaced at Trump rallies is “shut up and sing”, which has been repeated for Kelce as well, being “shut up and play”. The issue with these phrases that Trump supporters see as strong comebacks is that Swift and Kelce have not been present in the political scene at all recently. Yes, it is clear that Swift is more liberal, and she finally broke her silence politically back in 2018 during the midterm elections in Tennesee. She endorsed Phil Bredesen for the Senate and Jim Cooper for the House of Representatives. Since then she has not been overly active in politics and has not made any major moves showing that she is endorsing Biden for the 2024 election, and the same goes for Kelce. It is her fans who are louder than ever in supporting her and her political opinions, so the phrase “shut up and sing” is not very effective on the base of fans who are doing most of the talking.

“The conspiracy theories coming out of the Make America Great Again contingent were already legion: that Ms. Swift is a secret agent of the Pentagon and that she is bolstering her fan base in preparation for her endorsement of President Biden’s re-election,” New York Times reporter Johnathan Wiesman explained.

So to summarize the statements above, Trump supporters believe that Swift only did the Era’s tour for a year straight, (which she trained for by singing her entire three-hour set list while non-stop running on a treadmill), re-released four albums, is about to release a brand new album, and started dating a new man who happened to be an NFL player all to build her fan base for the sole purpose of endorsing President Biden in the 2024 election. Oh, and she is a secret agent for the Pentagon as a side job for fun in her spare time. Right, that adds up.

Republican politicians and activists can not seem to understand that messing with Swift, of all people, is not worth it either. Former U.S. Assistant Attorney General Jeff Clark attempted to take a hit at it on social media saying, “This is what happens when we cede culture to the Left. Brainless youth raising themselves on Taylor Swift’s saccharine bland music and that washing over into the serious world of politics.”

Of course, Clark got a whole mixture of comments back, some supportive, but also many from furious Swift superfans saying whatever they could to defend her. The best part is that everyone knows including Clark himself that he could not write a song half as good as any of Swift’s music to save his life. If he truly believes that the most popular musician in the world is going to be offended by some Republican politician saying her songs are “bland”, then he should be the one listening to the “Lover” album on repeat, and specifically the song “You need to calm down”.

The Anti-Taylor movement may be getting a lot of attention, but not so much support. It is derived from the insecurities of the Republican party and is led by mean, immature voices, which is the opposite of what Swift is and stands for. So while she continues to gain support while simply living out her Romeo and Juliet Love Story dreams with kindness and authenticity, Republicans can continue to have Bad Blood, pretending they are The Man and not being able to Shake It Off.