I am not a Swiftie. The only times I’ve heard Taylor Swift’s music, I’ve shut it off almost immediately, not because I disliked it, but because I realized it was far too catchy and would inevitably get stuck in my head. I didn’t want that to happen. But I’m increasingly coming around to the view that Taylor Swift should consider a presidential campaign. At this point, she might even be the only one who can save us.
Do I mean this seriously? I’m afraid I do.
Please hear me out. Right now, U.S. politics is facing a major crisis. The incumbent president is hugely unpopular. The overwhelming majority of voters do not want him to run again. Heck, two-thirds of Democrat-leaning voters don’t want Biden to run. When asked, they say that Biden is too old. Unfortunately for Biden, this is an insurmountable problem, because he gets older every day, to the point where his birthday cakes are now a serious fire hazard.
Biden’s handling of the Israel-Palestine conflict is only causing him more problems with voters, and his team can’t seem to convince the public that they should feel more positive about the economy than they actually do.
Despite all this, Democrats have no realistic primary options other than Biden. It looks like they’re going to be stuck with him, even though most of them indicate over and over that they don’t want him.
On the other side, we have Donald Trump, currently facing nearly 100 criminal charges. More concerning than Trump’s (alleged) criminality is his increasingly authoritarian bent. He has made promises to wipe out liberal “vermin,” purge the federal government of anyone who defies him, and maximize fossil fuel use.
I’m someone who believes avoiding a Trump presidency is absolutely essential, to preserve both democracy and the planet. But the polls show Trump is in the lead.
We need a deus ex machina. I can think of only one person with sufficient clout to possibly pull it off.
Amy Sussman/Getty Images
The two leading presidential candidates are widely loathed, and voters don’t want either of them. Taylor Swift, on the other hand, is the most popular public figure in America. In polls about the images of public figures, “Swift garners the highest favorable rating in the survey, well ahead of the major presidential candidates.” She has been single-handedly boosting the economies of cities across the country. She is a hard-working artist who inspires millions. She treats her workers well. TIME is right, in explaining her selection as Person of the Year, that “no one else on the planet today can move so many people so well.” (And even skeptics say that right now, she might be trying to “find a whole new world to conquer.”)
Anyone’s first reaction, of course, is that Taylor Swift is manifestly unqualified to be the President of the United States. This is not, however, a credible objection, because at the moment the most likely alternative appears to be Donald Trump, a former reality television star who sold mail-order steaks. If we discuss Donald Trump as a serious contender for the presidency, and we sadly must, there is no reason not to consider Swift an equally credible contender. I think any perceived differences in their level of suitability are entirely sexist.
Trump is a businessman in a suit. Swift is a businesswoman whose outfits happen to sparkle more.
In ordinary times, with highly qualified candidates running, I would never suggest a Draft Taylor Swift campaign. Yet we do not live in ordinary times. We live at a moment where democracy is on the line, and a deranged authoritarian is likely to take power if something does not happen to stop him.
It’s time to start entertaining seemingly crazy ideas.
Is a Taylor Swift presidency crazier than a Schwarzenegger or Ventura governorship, both of which happened and weren’t unsuccessful? I don’t think so. Again, I think there’s a tendency to see it as a more ludicrous idea than it actually is because of gender bias.
Swift is smart, seems to have relatively solid liberal politics, and is widely beloved and respected. In a moment where the nation is facing a crisis, I don’t know whether she’d lead us out of it, but I have a high level of confidence that she’d be vastly better than the alternatives. Her years in office might not bring us important, transformational policies like Medicare For All and a Green New Deal (although she might surprise us). But perhaps she can hold the country together just long enough for us to get our act together.
Personally, I’d breathe a sigh of relief at finally seeing the two-party duopoly broken and the selfish old white men who have been ruling us thrown out of D.C. for good.
To me, a longtime advocate of “lesser evil” voting, the relevant question is not “Would she be good?” Rather, it’s “could she be worse?” And at the very least, as we live through the disaster of a second Trump term, those of us who blared the warning signals will have our bumper sticker ready: Don’t Blame Me, I Voted For Taylor Swift.
Nathan J. Robinson is the editor in chief of Current Affairs magazine and the author of Responding to the Right: Brief Replies to 25 Conservative Arguments.
The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.