Kellyanne Conway mocked Taylor Swifts support for the Equality Act while singing You Need to Calm Down during an appearance on Fox News Tuesday.
The jab was in response to Swifts acceptance speech at the MTV Video Music Awards, where she criticized President Donald Trump and his administration for not responding to an official White House petition she started to garner an answer about their opposition to the Equality Act. The Equality Act ensures certain protections for LGBTQ+ people, and while it passed the House over the summer, it faltered in the Senate and does not have the support of the White House.
On Fox News, as Variety points out, Conway said that she liked Swifts song You Need to Calm Down and sang the line If you say it on the street, thats a knockout/If you put it in a tweet, thats a cop-out, before adding, I love that! I mean, that basically is Washington in a nutshell (its unclear if the Trump administration official recognized the irony in her statement).
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Conway went on to bemoan Hollywood and singers getting political, and suggested Swifts stance backfired, noting her support for the Democratic candidate in the 2018 Tennessee Senate race didnt pan out. Shes also somebody who went up against President Trump head to head in the United States Senate race in Tennessee and lost handily, Conway said. Marsha Blackburn is our United States senator now.
But while taking on Swift is one thing, Conway may have made a critical error in belittling the singers devoted fan base as well. I would love to ask her audience if they even know what that is, [what] the Equality Act is and isnt, Conway said. Shes welcome to her opinion. I can tell you theres a lot of poison pills in it.
When asked what those poison pills were, Conway offered no specifics and turned the conversation to the economy.
Along with Conways appearance on Fox News, the White House did share a response to Swifts Equality Act petition though as Pitchfork points out, the statement was basically the same one they shared in May: The Trump administration absolutely opposes discrimination of any kind and supports the equal treatment of all; however, the House-passed bill in its current form is filled with poison pills that threaten to undermine parental and conscience rights, White House deputy press secretary Judd Deere said.