Taylor Swift is heading to the Super Bowl – but if you believe right-wing conspiracy theorists it’s the Democrat Party who have just scored a touchdown.
Swift, a Grammy Award-winning singer who reportedly became a billionaire in 2023, has triggered suspicions that she is being used by the US defence department to psychologically manipulate people into voting for Joe Biden in this year’s presidential election.
The conspiracy theory, which has not been proven, has surfaced after Swift appeared on the field following the Kansas City Chiefs’ win over the Baltimore Ravens in Maryland on Sunday.
The 34-year-old singer’s boyfriend Travis Kelce is a tight end for the Chiefs – with the pair seen kissing after he scored a touchdown to help secure the team’s place in the Super Bowl on 11 February.
Vivek Ramaswamy, who dropped out of the race to become the Republican Party’s presidential candidate earlier this month, posted on the X social media platform that the match between the Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers will be rigged to favour “an artificially culturally propped-up couple”.
He added that he believes the couple will reveal a “major presidential endorsement” this autumn.
Mr Ramaswamy, who is now endorsing Donald Trump as the Republican nominee, wrote: “Just some wild speculation over here, let’s see how it ages over the next 8 months.”
His remarks fit in with comments made by other right-wing pundits who have suggested without evidence that all the hype around Swift, one of the most famous women in the world, could be part of a plot to drum-up hype for the Democrat Party ahead of this year’s presidential election.
Online conspiracist theorists have claimed her prominent role in US pop culture must be part of a psychological manipulation effort known as “psy-ops” – which they claim is orchestrated by the US defence department the Pentagon.
Following Swift’s appearance on the field at the NFL game, one of the most viewed posts on X came from the right-wing account End Wokeness.
It’s post said: “What’s happening with Taylor Swift is not organic and natural. It’s an op. We all feel it. We all know it.”
It comes after the Pentagon shut-down accusations from right-wing commentator Jesse Watters earlier this month, who claimed Swift was a potential “front for a covert political agenda”.
Mr Watters said: “It’s real. The Pentagon psy-op unit pitched NATO on turning Taylor Swift into an asset for combating misinformation online.”
He was referring to a clip from a 2019 NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence conference that appeared to show a presenter naming Swift as an example of a powerful influencer.
At the end of the segment, which aired during his Fox News show, Mr Watters said he had “no evidence” of the conspiracy.
The speaker in the clip, Alicia Marie Bargar, later told Business Insider that her comment was taken out of context and that she has no connection to the Pentagon or to NATO.
Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh described Mr Watters’ commentary as a “conspiracy theory”.
“We are going to shake it off,” she told Politico in a reference to a popular Swift song.
A spokesperson for Swift declined to comment.
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Swift was almost entirely apolitical until 2018 when she endorsed two Democrats in Tennessee, where she lived as a teenager.
Her public support for the Democrats came after she faced scrutiny from fans on the left for her silence on various political issues
In her Netflix documentary Miss Americana, which debuted in 2020, she expressed regret over not speaking out against Mr Trump during the 2016 election.
