US Politics
James Comey prompts MAGA outrage after outing himself as a Taylor Swift fan
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Former FBI director James Comey has unexpectedly outed himself as a fan of Taylor Swift, saying her music serves as his “coping mechanism” in the face of renewed hostility from President Donald Trump.
Comey, 64, who was fired by Trump in 2017, took to his Substack on Sunday to post an oddly formal video in which he praised the pop superstar as “a truly inspirational public figure” and said that “of course” he had watched her recent interview with the Kelce Brothers.
“Taylor Swift and I go way back,” he explained. “I went to my first concert of hers 15 years ago. I’ve been to a second and I have helped financially support the attendance of a lot of family members and others. I’m in a family’s Swiftie group chat. I know all her music, and I listen to it in my headphones when I cut the grass.”
MAGA commentators including Benny Johnson and Dinesh D’Souza were quick to deride Comey over the bizarre video, which was arguably still not as weird as the affair he found himself caught up in earlier this summer after he posted a photograph on Instagram of sea shells arranged on a beach to spell out “8647,” which was interpreted as a veiled call for Trump to be assassinated, leading to a Justice Department investigation.
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Comey stated that his favorite Swift tracks are “All Too Well” (specifying the 10-minute version) and “Exile” featuring Bon Iver, and praised the star by saying she had soundtracked his family’s life, produced “great art” and served as a role model for his children.
Pivoting to the actual theme of his quasi-sermon, Comey said: “Like a lot of you, I struggle with how to stand up to bullies without letting their meanness infect me and change me.”
Discussing California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recent parodies of Trump’s posting style on social media, he said, “I find it very funny. Hilarious even, sometimes. But I’ve got to be honest, it also leaves me with a strange feeling at times because I don’t want us to become like Trump and his followers.
“There are far more decent, honest, kind people in America than there are mean jerks, and don’t get me wrong, we have our jerks, millions of them. You may have noticed! In particular, there’s a stunning coarseness and ugliness in the Republican Party today.
“It’s upsetting, but it’s also a minority of America. On the whole, we aren’t like that and we don’t like that.”
Circling back to Swift, Comey noted that she had “made clear that she sees Donald Trump for what he is,” having endorsed Joe Biden and then Kamala Harris in the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections.
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“While our elderly, makeup-covered president is posting about whether Taylor Swift is still ‘hot’ and declaring that he can’t stand her, what’s she doing? Living her best life, producing great music, and, as she urged all of us to do during the podcast, not giving the jerks power over her mind.”
After praising Arthur C Brooks’ articles on happiness in The Atlantic, Comey concluded by reciting lyrics from Swift’s 2010 song “Mean” as his anthem of defiance: “I bet you got pushed around, somebody made you cold, but the cycle ends right now, because you can’t lead me down that road.”
Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard has since moved to refer several Obama administration officials – including Comey, ex-CIA director John Brennan and her predecessor James Clapper – to the same department for prosecution over allegations they had “manufactured” intelligence to substantiate the idea that Russia meddled in the 2016 presidential election to help Trump beat Hillary Clinton.