Current:Home > StocksDonald Trump addresses AI Taylor Swift campaign photos: 'I don't know anything about them' -InvestTomorrow
Donald Trump addresses AI Taylor Swift campaign photos: 'I don't know anything about them'
View
Date:2025-04-18 04:09:35
A Taylor Swift song to soundtrack Donald Trump’s latest political controversy? Alexa, play "Don’t Blame Me."
During an interview with Fox News published Wednesday, the former president and 2024 Republican presidential nominee addressed his recent social media posts that contained suspected artificial intelligence-generated images of Swift in support of his campaign.
When asked by Fox Business correspondent Grady Trimble if he was “worried” about the pop superstar taking legal action against him, Trump claimed he had no knowledge of the origins of the images, which were posted to Truth Social over the weekend.
"I don't know anything about them other than somebody else generated them. I didn’t generate them," said Trump, although he did not name the creator of the images. "These were all made up by other people."
Trump said AI is "always very dangerous in that way," citing his own experiences with AI impersonations.
Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle.
"It’s happening with me too," he said. "They’re having me speak – I speak perfectly, absolutely perfectly – on AI, and I’m endorsing other products and things."
Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement to Fox News Digital that "Swifties for Trump is a massive movement that grows bigger every single day," adding, "While Kamala Harris is guilty as sin for all the hurt she has caused every American."
USA TODAY has reached out to a representative for the Trump campaign for comment.
AI-generated images of Trump have previously circulated on social media, including fabricated photos of the former president being taken into police custody, attending a cookout with Black supporters and leading a crowd down a street lined with American flags.
Read more:Donald Trump posts fake Taylor Swift endorsement, Swifties for Trump AI images
Donald Trump shares fake Taylor Swift endorsement on social media
On Sunday, Trump took to Truth Social and posted several purportedly AI-generated images alluding to Taylor Swift and Swifties' support for his campaign, despite the singer vocalizing disdain for the Republican nominee in the past.
"Taylor wants you to vote for Donald Trump," read one generated image of Swift as Uncle Sam, while another seemingly AI image, marked as satire, read, "Swifties turning to Trump after ISIS foiled Taylor Swift concert." The latter image referenced a suspected terrorist plot planned for Swift's Vienna concert earlier this month. Austrian authorities, with help from U.S. officials, thwarted the alleged attack.
The pictures included a mix of real and AI images, including of Swifties for Trump supporters, akin to the real group MAGA Swifties.
Popstars and politics:Trump campaign removes video after reports Beyoncé sent cease and desist
What are Taylor Swift's political views?
The "I Can Do it With a Broken Heart" singer has not endorsed a candidate for the 2024 presidential election. However, she gave insight into her political beliefs in her 2020 Netflix documentary "Miss Americana."
While discussing her endorsement of U.S. Senate candidate Phil Bredesen, D-Tenn., in the 2018 midterm elections, Swift’s publicist Tree Paine warned her about Trump coming after her. Swift quipped, "I don't care. If I get bad press for saying, 'Don't put a homophobic racist in office,' then I get bad press for that."
The conversation resulted in Swift's Oct. 7, 2018, Instagram post in which she cautioned her fans to not vote for Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn. (Blackburn was ultimately elected to the U.S. Senate.)
"In the past I’ve been reluctant to publicly voice my political opinions, but due to several events in my life and in the world in the past two years, I feel very differently about that now. I always have and always will cast my vote based on which candidate will protect and fight for the human rights I believe we all deserve in this country," her caption read.
Swift wrote that she "cannot support Marsha Blackburn" because "her voting record in Congress appalls and terrifies me."
After listing Blackburn's stances on issues such as women's safety and LGBTQ+ rights, Swift wrote: "These are not MY Tennessee values."
Contributing: Taijuan Moorman, Joedy McCreary and KiMi Robinson, USA TODAY
veryGood! (5)
Related
- Why members of two of EPA's influential science advisory committees were let go
- Harris plans to continue to build presidential momentum in speech to teachers union
- Iowa judge lifts injunction blocking state's 6-week abortion ban
- Coco Gauff joins LeBron James as US flag bearers for opening ceremony
- Krispy Kreme offers a free dozen Grinch green doughnuts: When to get the deal
- Falsehoods about Kamala Harris' citizenship status, racial identity resurface online as she becomes likely Democratic nominee
- Former University of Florida president will return on an interim basis after Ben Sasse’s resignation
- Woman dies in West Virginia’s second reported coal mining fatality of 2024
- 'Survivor' 47 finale, part one recap: 2 players were sent home. Who's left in the game?
- Facing closure, The Ivy nursing home sues state health department
Ranking
- 2 killed, 3 injured in shooting at makeshift club in Houston
- Claim to Fame: Oscar Winner’s Nephew Sent Home in Jaw-Dropping Reveal
- Wind farms’ benefits to communities can be slow or complex, leading to opposition and misinformation
- Disney reaches tentative agreement with California theme park workers
- Meet the volunteers risking their lives to deliver Christmas gifts to children in Haiti
- Winter Olympians will compete at these 13 venues when the Games return to Salt Lake City in 2034
- National Tequila Day: What's happening with the spirit and where to get specials
- Terminal at New York’s JFK Airport briefly evacuated because of escalator fire
Recommendation
B.A. Parker is learning the banjo
Secret DEA files show agents joked about rape in WhatsApp chat. Then one of them was accused of it.
National Tequila Day: What's happening with the spirit and where to get specials
MLS All-Star Game vs. Liga MX: Rosters, game time, how to watch on live stream
Bodycam footage shows high
Strike Chain Trading Center: The Importance of the US MSB License
Future locations of the Summer, Winter Olympic Games beyond 2024
Phoenix man sentenced to life in prison without parole after killing his parents and younger brother