Taylor Swift fans are demonstrating that the power of fandom goes far beyond selling out stadiums and bringing in new viewers to watch NFL games (or, specifically, Travis Kelce, the singer’s football player boyfriend). This week, a group of Swift’s fans launched “Swifties for Kamala,” a coalition to support Democratic presential nominee Kamala Harris—and they’re already making waves.
The group raised more than $122,000 for the Harris campaign during a two-hour kickoff Zoom call on Tuesday, which featured remarks from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, and the musician Carole King. King sang the chorus of her favorite Swift song, “Shake It Off,” in the call.
“I am looking forward to the era of the first woman president,” Warren told the singer’s fans on the call. “Swifties, you can get this done.”
The birth of a movement. Swifties for Kamala began on July 21, the day President Joe Biden announced that he wouldn’t seek reelection. That day, Texas student and fellow Swift fan Emerald Medrano was talking to his sister when he saw the news. In response, Medrano posted a tweet.
“I feel like us U.S swifties should mass organize and help campaign for Kamala Harris and spread how horrendous project 2025 would be to help get people's butts down to the polls in November,” the student said, adding a sobbing face emoji. “[L]ike if we don't want democracy to end we really need to move and push blue votes.”
Medrano’s tweet went viral. Within three hours, he told The Cut in July, the organization had a name, a Discord chat, and hundreds of volunteers. Two days later, they had their mission statement:
“Swifties for Harris [now Swifties for Kamala] is a coalition of Taylor Swift fans committed to protecting the United States of America’s historical democracy by working together to help elect progressive candidates in local and national elections, including Vice President Kamala Harris for our country’s next president. We believe Harris has the experience, integrity, wit, and stamina to beat Donald Trump,” it read.
It should be noted that Swifties for Kamala is not officially affiliated with Swift or Harris.
Plans. Seeing a fandom-led coalition in a political race isn’t exactly common. As such, many might be asking themselves what exactly the Swifties for Kamala are planning to do. It’s a good question. According to its website, the group’s activities include hosting virtual and in-person events to support Harris, registering voters, and educating them on who’s running and other initiatives, such as Project 2025. It will also offer volunteers opportunities to host debate watch parties and phone banks.
The group is also clear about what its priorities are. In its mission statement, it shares that it supports abortion rights, LGBTQIA+ rights, common sense gun laws, and a permanent ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, among other issues.
Swifties for Kamala is working to “harness our Swiftie power into political power,” April Glick Pulito, the group’s political director, said on Tuesday’s Zoom call.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a Swiftie coalition without friendship bracelets, which is group is doing, too. Fans are encouraged to create friendship bracelets with the phrases “Kamala 24,""In My Voting Era,” and “Not Going Back,” among others, and sharing their creations on social media under the #Swifties4Kamala hashtag. The group also has official merch, which it's selling to help organizations that register voters.
Swifties for Kamala merch. | Image: Swifties for Kamala x Social Goods
Swifties for Trump. Swifties for Harris’ official launch comes days after Trump made headlines for perpetuating the idea that Swift had endorsed him, posting “I accept!” on Truth Social along with AI-created photos of the singer. But Swift had not endorsed Trump.
After it became known that Swift could potentially sue Trump for disseminating a fake endorsement, the former president called AI “dangerous” and said he didn’t know the images were fake.
“I didn’t generate them,” Trump said in an interview on Fox News. “Somebody came out. They said, ‘oh, look at this.’ These were all made up by other people. AI is always very dangerous in that way.”
It’s not clear if there’s a real Swifties for Trump movement yet, although Trump’s campaign manager Steven Cheung told CNN that Swifties for Trump was a “massive movement that grows bigger every single day!”
The initial impact. Besides raising $122,000 for the Harris campaign, Swifties for Kamala on Tuesday onboarded more than 2,000 new volunteers, drove 41,000 voter registration checks, and 27,000 relational registration referrals.
To date, the group boasts more than 250,000 followers on its social media accounts, and it's certainly attracting attention from those in power. Besides Warren, the lineup of speakers on the call included Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and Sen. Ed Markey.
"Swifties aren’t just a bunch of little girls posting on the internet; we are a broad coalition spanning diversity in race, age, gender, sexuality, geographic location—and while we do love posting on the internet and making cute bracelets, we are willing to do a lot more than that, especially when it comes to our rights and freedoms," Annie Wu Henry, the group's campaign manager, said in a statement.
The endorsement, Taylor’s version. So far, Swift hasn’t endorsed any presidential candidate during this election cycle. She endorsed Biden and Harris in 2020, but there’s no guarantee that she will endorse someone this year. That’s not stopping fans, though.
Speaking to The Cut, Medrano, the co-founder of Swifties for Kamala, said that while an official Swift endorsement could activate more of the fanbase, the movement was about “what we as Swifties wanna see in the White House—the issues we care about, what we want to see represented.”
“Taylor always told us, ‘Be fearless. Speak now. Go after what you want and you can make it happen.’ Like she has done herself in the music industry,” Medrano said. “We’re following her example in this way and taking the initiative ourselves.”
Images | Paolo Villanueva
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