Nearly One in Five Americans Believe Taylor Swift Election Conspiracy Theory, Poll Finds

The baseless conspiracy theory began earlier in the NFL season when predominantly far-right social media users began pushing a narrative that the NFL season was rigged to ensure the Kansas City Chiefs make the Super Bowl. Then, that President Joe Biden and Taylor Swift further concocted a plan for them to win the 2024 Super Bowl.

From there, the world famous super star would supposedly use the win to officially endorse Biden and increase the amount of women voting in the 2024 election.

The reasons as to why/how this became a theory are not entirely known.

“The supposed Taylor Swift PsyOp conspiracy has legs among a decent number of Trump supporters. Even many who hadn’t heard about it before we polled them accept the idea as credible. Welcome to the 2024 election,” said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute.

In 2023, the singer posted a short message on Instagram encouraging her 272 million followers to register to vote. Soon after the organization she directed her fans to register at --- the nonpartisan nonprofit Vote.org --- recorded more than 35,000 registrations.

"I've been so lucky to see so many of you guys at my U.S. shows recently. I've heard you raise your voices, and I know how powerful they are. Make sure you're ready to use them in our elections this year!" she wrote on her Instagram Stories, including a link to register at Vote.org.

Swift has been the center of right-wing conspiracy theories including that she is some sort of "Pentagon plant". Republicans have been concerned that Swift's popularity would be used as leverage by the Democrats to swing the 2024 presidential election.

In 2020, Swift endorsed the Biden-Harris ticket and while she did not publicly endorse Hillary Clinton in 2016, she has previously suggested she could have done more to criticize Donald Trump regretting her previous political silence. 

President Joe Biden has played into the conspiracy theory. The Super Bowl which had its 65,000 in-stadium audience, and the millions watching at home or out with friends, on the edges of their seats as the Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers in overtime. Following the KC victory, Biden shared an oft-used image of him with his eyes shooting out red laser beams --- which is now being referred to as "Dark Brandon" --- captioning it, "Just like we drew it up".

It also wasn't the first time POTUS has poked fun at the conspiracy theory. Earlier in the day, a video was shared to the president's TikTok where he was playing "This or That." He was asked which it was true out of "Deviously plotting to rig the season so the Chiefs would make the Super Bowl" or "The Chiefs being just a good football team?"

He replied, "I'd get in trouble if I told you," Biden said, before the camera cut to a shot of "Dark Brandon."