With her GDP-boosting concerts, Taylor Swift may be the world’s biggest pop star, but can she sway an entire election?
Well, Donald Trump seems to think so. Ahead of Kamala Harris’s headline-grabbing speech at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) this week, her opponent, and former US president, shared a series of images appearing to show Swift’s support for his campaign.
The only problem was they were fake. Anyone with half a brain cell could tell the eerily hyper-realistic pics were the product of an AI image generator. Trump shared the shots, which included young women wearing merchandise emblazoned with the slogan ‘Swifties for Trump’, with the caption “I accept!”.
Swift’s fans vowed revenge, demanding that their icon sue Trump for falsely aligning her with his bid for the White House.
While legal orders have yet to be served, Trump has addressed the ensuing furore. Asked by Fox News (via Mediaite) if he was worried Swift was going to sue him, he essentially said that he couldn’t be held liable for the pics as he didn’t make them.
“I don’t know anything about them, other than somebody else generated them,” Trump said of the AI images, adding: “I didn’t generate them.”
He then warned of the dangers of deepfakes – artificially generated images and clips that depict people doing or saying things they never did.
“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,” Trump said.
“It’s happening with me, too. They’re making... having me speak. I speak perfectly, I mean, absolutely perfectly on AI, and I’m, like, endorsing other products and things. It’s a little bit dangerous out there.”
There’s a reason his fans have taken to calling him the Teflon don.
Trump’s statement comes as speculation grows as to whether Swift will repeat her endorsement of the Democrats from 2018 by backing Harris. Rumours were rife that the Bad Blood singer and Beyoncé would make an appearance at the DNC, but they ultimately turned out to be false.
Instead, the event featured a performance by Stevie Wonder. He may not be as popular with the kids, but he’s still the GOAT.
