White House press secretary invokes federal law to avoid Taylor Swift question

Karine Jean-Pierre cited the Hatch Act as a reason she couldn’t address speculation that Joe Biden would join Swift on tour.

The plot of Taylor Swift’s political era just took an unexpectedly hilarious turn, as White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre invoked federal law to avoid a question about the pop star’s potential involvement in Joe Biden’s 2024 presidential campaign.

Jean-Pierre, the first Black, openly LGBT person in history to hold the press secretary position, fielded a question from CNN’s John Berman Monday about rumors suggesting that Biden could potentially make an appearance on one of Swift’s upcoming Eras Tour dates.

Karine Jean-Pierre; Joe Biden; Taylor Swift.TING SHEN/BLOOMBERG VIA GETTY IMAGES; NICOLE NERI/BLOOMBERG VIA GETTY IMAGES; MARCELO ENDELLI/TAS23/GETTY IMAGES

“Let me first say, I’ve got to be really mindful. I’m a federal employee, as you know, there’s something called the Hatch Act, so I certainly can not speak to anything that is related to 2024 in the upcoming election,” Jean-Pierre said, referencing the Hatch Act of 1939, which prohibits federal employees from engaging in select political affairs. “Obviously, there are a lot of, in my shop, in the press office shop, there are a lot of Swifties, if you will: fans of Taylor Swift. I’m just going to leave it there. I’m not going to get into the president’s schedule at all from here, as it relates to the 2024 elections.”

Berman then quipped that Jean-Pierre’s reply might’ve been the “first time the Hatch Act has been invoked in regards to Taylor Swift,” to which the press secretary chuckled.

In recent months, Swift’s role in the American political landscape has been both praised and lambasted by both sides of the political divide, with Fox News personalities even hawking a theory that the government allegedly floated the idea of using Swift as a psychological operative to control public opinion.

“You know, I have to say, when we talk about snowflakes, you people worry about the weirdest stuff,” Whoopi Goldberg said of the speculation on a recent episode of The View — the panelists who regularly praise Swift for encouraging her supporters to vote. “She got people to go out and vote, including probably all kinds of people that you’d rather not have voting. If she can get people to do that, why would you say that was a bad thing or talk about it like you’re disparaging it? What kind of bull…?”