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1:15

BBC Sounds. Music, radio,

1:17

podcasts. Hi, AmeriCasters. It's

1:19

Marianna here. I hope

1:21

you enjoyed the previous episode, which looked at

1:23

President Biden's age and memory. Go back and

1:26

listen if you've not had a chance. I

1:28

also wanted to highlight an episode from our

1:30

sister podcast, The Global Story, with Katya Adler.

1:33

She's looked into one of America's favourite

1:36

topics, Taylor Swift and her influence. There's

1:39

loads of talk of her swinging the US

1:41

presidential election result. Republicans close

1:43

to Donald Trump seem spooked. What's their

1:45

thinking? Have a listen

1:47

to this episode of The Global Story, and if you like

1:50

it, subscribe to the podcast. Hello,

1:52

I'm Katya Adler from the BBC World

1:54

Service. This is The Global Story. Friday

2:00

we focus on one story in detail

2:02

with the help of the BBC's best

2:04

journalists. Today we're

2:06

talking about the world's biggest pop

2:08

star. Her

2:13

mind-blowingly popular era's concert tour, the Asian

2:15

leg of it has just opened in

2:18

Japan, is so huge it's boosted the

2:20

economies of the country she's visited as

2:22

part of it. And her romance with

2:24

one of the star players at the

2:27

Super Bowl this Sunday will cement her

2:29

influence in almost every corner of American

2:31

culture. Of course, I'm talking

2:34

about Taylor Swift. Hi, I'm Taylor.

2:38

But as much as her fans adore

2:40

her, there's one group of Americans who

2:42

seem to fear her. Just please don't

2:44

believe everything Taylor Swift says, we're all begging you. Powerful

2:47

allies of Donald Trump worry about Taylor

2:49

Swift's political influence. If you're gonna be

2:51

honest about what you think and how

2:53

you feel and what you believe in, you

2:56

have to put it out there. But

2:58

could she really swing a US

3:00

presidential election? With

3:05

me today is Erin Delmore,

3:07

our North America business correspondent,

3:09

and very importantly for this

3:11

episode, a committed Swifty, I

3:14

understand. That is a

3:16

big fan of Taylor Swift for the uninitiated

3:18

like me. Tell us all. Why? Katja,

3:21

I have no problem going on the record and stating that. Look,

3:24

Taylor Swift is the person of the year

3:27

right now. It's not my distinction.

3:29

It's Time magazine's from 2023. I

3:33

think a lot of us have been committed to her music and her

3:35

artistry for a long time now. For me, I think we could go back

3:37

a little bit more than a decade. And

3:41

as she's made her albums and grown as an artist and as

3:43

a person, it's been fun to be close to this age cohort

3:46

and grow along with her. We

3:49

talk about the eras tour and the eras that she's been

3:51

through. I think everybody can hear one of her songs and

3:53

remember where they were when it started playing in a cycle

3:56

on the radio. And if it brings a smile to your

3:58

face and you think it's a good bop, You're

4:00

probably a 60. I quite like that. A good bop.

4:03

When you say that, you know, she's having

4:05

a moment right now, Mark

4:07

Savage, our music correspondent at the BBC,

4:10

he's described her as being in her

4:12

imperial phase. I mean, that's quite something

4:14

to say. Oh, my goodness. What a

4:16

title for an era. Look,

4:18

she has her era's tour going on

4:21

right now. That is the wildly popular

4:23

culturally seismic event of the year, of

4:25

last year and this year, because it

4:27

just keeps going, moving around the world.

4:30

And at the same time, she's now won 14 Grammys. She's

4:32

been at the top of the Billboard charts

4:34

more times than I can count. She amassed

4:36

a billion-dollar fortune, that's a billion with a

4:38

B, and she has this

4:41

tight, personal, emotional connection with her

4:43

fans. That's the thing that

4:45

to me really resonates and kind of elevates her

4:48

from superstar to almost

4:50

cult status star. It's

4:52

incredible. Here in Belgium, there's quite

4:54

a few universities do English language courses. I

4:57

think it's in Ghent. They've got an

5:00

English literature course that looks at literature

5:02

across the ages, so spanning centuries. But

5:05

everything is linked to Taylor Swift,

5:07

so it's through themes in Taylor

5:09

Swift's music. And the professor

5:11

says, of course, the attendance at

5:13

her course has doubled. And

5:15

this sort of gives you an idea not just of the

5:18

loyal following, but also the economics

5:20

of all of this. And

5:22

Taylor-nomics, I think, is now an

5:24

accepted phrase. Yeah, I've heard

5:26

it. I mean, if the Fed, that's the

5:28

US Federal Reserve. If they're talking about the

5:31

economic impact of Taylor Swift, she's

5:33

probably onto something. And just

5:35

like you said, it's almost like everybody wants a

5:37

piece of this pie here. I mean, growing up,

5:40

I remember a friend of mine launched a course

5:42

at my alma mater about the poetry of Jay-Z's

5:44

music. I remember seeing one about Bruce Springsteen. It's

5:47

not an unknown concept, but this is rarefied territory

5:49

for an artist to get into. And

5:51

it's the kind of thing that spans generations and

5:53

brings a level of legitimacy to

5:55

something that could have been seen as

5:58

frivolous. I mean, not every pop- icon

6:00

is taken as seriously as she is,

6:02

both in terms of her relevance

6:04

not only to the industry, but in

6:06

politics, which we're going to get to

6:08

today, and in business, and in her

6:10

ability to move national and local economies

6:12

and amass her own fortune as a

6:15

savvy business person. There's a lot

6:17

here, and there's a reason why she has so many eyeballs and

6:19

so much attention on her. So you

6:21

say this almost casually, you know,

6:23

moving local economies. Yeah, it's not

6:25

a casual thing. It's not

6:27

a, it is really not a casual thing. I think

6:29

while we're talking about cost of living crisis

6:32

and also the music industry in crisis, Taylor

6:34

Swift talks the trend and that tour that

6:36

she's on, this era's tour, you went to

6:38

one of her concerts. I did. Describe

6:40

to us the atmosphere and the merch. I mean,

6:43

just to give us a little idea about sort

6:45

of the economic pull of all of this. Gotcha.

6:49

It's an entire production. First

6:52

of all, trying to get tickets. I think

6:54

Taylor described this herself as going through a

6:56

bear fight, just with people trying to get

6:58

through Ticketmaster with that whole debacle of getting

7:00

their hands on tickets. Personally, I live in

7:02

New York City. Of course I

7:04

didn't get them in neighboring New Jersey. My

7:07

friends and my sister drove out to Pittsburgh,

7:09

which is not close. That's probably

7:11

a six hour road trip. I think it took us.

7:13

And what does that mean? That means that we filled

7:15

the car up with gas. That means that we got

7:17

a hotel for the night. It means we went

7:19

out and we spent money on our outfits

7:21

and we had merch. We got little, you

7:24

know, mirror balls that held drinks and we

7:26

had temporary tattoos and friendship bracelets and the

7:28

work, not to mention, yeah, I spent $50

7:30

on a t-shirt. I'm mortified

7:32

to say it, but I did. All

7:35

of this adds up. This

7:37

is the highest grossing tour of all time. The

7:39

first to surpass the billion dollar mark. And

7:42

the Federal Reserve said it could ultimately generate something

7:44

like $5 billion in

7:46

consumer spending. I've seen numbers

7:48

even higher. The Washington Post has $5.7 billion. And

7:52

Katia, if you want to get your hands and your head

7:55

around how big a number that is, that's

7:57

like sending $17 in chains. to

8:00

every American, a wild number. It's

8:02

wild and it means that every

8:04

country where she's appearing on

8:07

tour will also be seeing some kind

8:09

of economic benefit. And what

8:11

surprised me, again, I'm really sorry,

8:13

I'm not a Swifty, but

8:16

reading about her and learning more

8:18

about her, I was interested to

8:20

see that a recent poll in

8:22

the US said that

8:24

53% of US adults

8:27

describe themselves as fans of Taylor

8:29

Swift. I mean, those are the

8:31

figures that politicians would die for

8:33

really, isn't it? Oh, yes. You

8:35

know, 53% is a nice big number. I

8:38

used to work for someone who would say

8:40

that you're not famous unless half the people

8:42

in the country hate you, so that seems

8:44

to hold. But 53% being fans is a

8:47

big deal. And you know, this poll by

8:49

Morning Consult was helpful in breaking down who

8:51

we see as Taylor Swift fans. Largely, we're

8:53

talking about women, we're talking about

8:55

millennials, we're talking about white women and suburban

8:57

women. And yeah, it's a cohort

8:59

that you might expect. You know, I've been to quite

9:01

a few Taylor Swift concerts at this point in time.

9:03

It is who you see when you look around the room.

9:06

Those are votes that every presidential candidate

9:08

wants. We're

9:13

gonna go into the politics now, because I thought it was

9:15

also interesting in this breakdown that there's quite a, even

9:18

though it's mainly women and white women,

9:20

there's men featured pretty heavily in there,

9:22

and Republican voters as well. So if

9:24

we have a look at some of

9:26

the rouse that we've been hearing about

9:28

around Taylor Swift, the most recent ones,

9:30

there's always rouse around Taylor Swift, and

9:32

from some of the high profile types

9:34

around Donald Trump, and they seem to

9:36

be angry. Rolling Stone

9:38

has quoted a source close

9:40

to Donald Trump saying that they are

9:42

launching a holy war on the pop

9:44

star. What is this about?

9:46

There's a lot to unpack here, actually,

9:49

because there's a very real messaging

9:51

going on in politics,

9:54

and especially in right wing circles, that

9:56

at the moment is very anti-Taylor Swift.

9:58

Now, under that, We have

10:00

a conspiracy theory that floats

10:03

around. And I'll explain it to you,

10:05

but please keep in mind that this is a conspiracy theory.

10:07

It's that Taylor Swift is a

10:10

PSYOP, a psychological operation launched by

10:12

the Democratic Party or the Biden

10:14

administration or the US government or

10:16

the CIA or the Pentagon to

10:18

basically, in short, throw the election

10:21

to Biden. The idea is that the

10:23

Chiefs, her boyfriend is on the

10:25

Kansas City Chiefs football team is

10:28

engineered to win the NFL regular season

10:30

and go to the Super Bowl and win the Super Bowl and then

10:32

she and her boyfriend will endorse the president. Now

10:35

that is a lot, obviously,

10:37

to take in, but what's very real is

10:40

the reaction around it and that we've seen

10:42

a lot of people from the right-wing Republican

10:44

side, sometimes called the modern Republicans, speaking up

10:46

against Taylor Swift. To

10:48

me, this is an effective way

10:50

to negate what might be an endorsement coming

10:52

down the line from Swift to try to

10:55

suck a little bit of the power out

10:57

of that. It's also

10:59

potentially a way to start ceding

11:01

some distrust in how this

11:03

election is carried out. That's something

11:06

that we have seen for years in American politics

11:08

at this point in time and it is something

11:10

that the public is susceptible to picking up, absorbing

11:12

and believing. So I see two very real undercurrents

11:14

in this messaging and they're worth paying attention to.

11:18

So that's interesting because, I mean, suggesting that

11:20

Taylor Swift and her boyfriend are actually cops.

11:23

It does sound a bit mad, frankly. That's why

11:25

it's a conspiracy theory. But if this is centered

11:28

around the idea that she may

11:30

end up endorsing Joe Biden,

11:33

let's have a look at what we actually

11:35

know about her politics. She

11:38

originated as this all-American girl,

11:40

this goddess of country, if

11:42

you like, and in

11:44

those days, in those earlier days,

11:46

there was nothing, no whiff of

11:48

politics around what she was saying.

11:51

But for a long time, the thought here in

11:53

the Taylor Swift camp had been, this

11:55

is not my lane. My lane

11:58

is making music, artistry, songwriting. not

12:00

politics, not wading into the fray. And when you

12:02

especially think about somebody who came to the music

12:05

industry quite young, someone who

12:08

was very careful about the fan

12:10

base she cultivated and not alienating

12:12

those fans, it makes enough

12:14

sense. So what we're leading up to

12:16

here, Erin, is the fact that Taylor

12:18

Swift hasn't stayed quite on

12:20

politics a bit later, but that initial

12:22

reticence, as well as her being so

12:24

young and finding her way with her

12:27

fan base as well, does

12:29

it also have to do with the realm of

12:31

country music in particular, do you think? Because the

12:33

fan base there might be more conservative.

12:39

Absolutely, and that is the reputation for country

12:42

music fans here in the United States. They

12:44

tend to come from the central part or

12:46

the southern part of the country, which do

12:48

lean more red. You know,

12:50

wading into a political battle or

12:52

political issues isn't always a winning

12:55

streak for an actor or an artist

12:57

or a musician. A lot of times there

12:59

can be blowback. We saw that with the

13:02

Dixie Chicks. If I remember correctly, that goes

13:04

back to the Second Iraq War and they're

13:06

a country band and they were critical of

13:08

George W. Bush at the time, the president

13:11

at the time. And that

13:13

alienated many of their fans. There was

13:15

real blowback against them in the country

13:18

music industry and in their listenership.

13:20

And if you're a person who's coming up in country

13:22

music during that period of time, that's not lost on

13:24

you at all. And Dolly Parton

13:26

is someone who serves as an example,

13:28

couldn't be more popular in the United

13:30

States and couldn't be more popular among

13:32

both Democrats and Republicans. She has famously

13:34

stayed out of the fray, even

13:37

going so far as to decline invitations for

13:39

awards from the White House because she doesn't

13:41

want to be awarded from any one president

13:43

from a political party over others. She is

13:45

so careful about her image and she has

13:48

retained the love of people across the political

13:50

spectrum. Well, from what I know of Taylor

13:52

Swift, less about the lyrics. I'm

13:55

afraid you'd put me to shame that. But

13:57

definitely this is somebody who you can see

13:59

carefully cultivate. image at all times.

14:01

So what persuaded her and when to

14:04

start getting involved or speaking out

14:07

about politics? We do see

14:09

her change her tune a little bit later in her career

14:11

and we can bookmark it. I mean, if you think about the year 2016,

14:14

Donald Trump came into the White House,

14:17

a real big moment in American politics

14:19

and a divisive moment, a big reckoning

14:21

for a lot of people who tended

14:23

to lean leftward and a shock. She

14:26

came in and in 2018 weighed in and

14:30

supported the Democratic candidate for Senate in her

14:32

home state of Tennessee. That person didn't win,

14:34

but she urged people to register to vote

14:36

and we did see voter registration spike. Interestingly,

14:39

she said she regretted not vocally

14:41

supporting Hillary Clinton in 2016.

14:44

And for someone who had been so private for

14:46

so many years about politics, fans got

14:48

to see the curtain peeled back a little bit in a

14:50

documentary called Miss Americano. She talks about this decision

14:52

to come out in 2018. So

14:56

you think... I

14:59

don't care if they write that. I'm

15:02

sad that I didn't two years ago, but I

15:04

can't change that. And

15:15

that was the Netflix documentary that I have

15:17

seen, Miss Americano. It's

15:20

important to make clear, isn't it, Erin, that

15:22

Taylor Swift hasn't said anything

15:24

about whether or not she might

15:26

endorse Joe Biden's candidacy for

15:28

president this year. But we have

15:31

over the years learned a lot

15:33

about her values. Absolutely. She's been

15:35

vocal about her support for the

15:37

LGBTQ community and her stance

15:39

against race inequality. And we also see this in

15:41

the actors she chooses to cast. She picked a

15:43

transgender actor to act as her love interest in

15:46

one of her recent music videos. Those kinds of

15:48

things are not lost on her fans who look

15:50

for the minutiae in everything she does. So we've

15:52

talked about Taylor Swift's popularity. Huge, huge

15:55

in the US and some of

15:57

her personal views. But it's quite...

16:00

something else to suggest that she could

16:02

decide pretty much who's going to be

16:04

the next President of the United States. So, Erin, I

16:07

hope you can explain all of that to me. This

16:14

is the Global Story. We bring you one

16:17

big international story in detail five days

16:19

a week. Follow or subscribe wherever

16:21

you listen. With me is

16:23

Erin Delmore, our North America business

16:25

correspondent. Today, with a slightly different

16:27

crown and perhaps some sequins, Taylor

16:29

Swift correspondent today, Erin. Thank you

16:31

so much. Now, I

16:34

am curious because I totally

16:36

get that Taylor Swift is a

16:39

huge phenomenon for fans in

16:42

the US and further afield. But

16:45

to suggest that she could swing

16:47

an election, to me that just

16:49

sounds a little bit exaggerated. But

16:51

I'm sort of taking it that

16:53

four supporters of Donald Trump to

16:55

come out and be so vocal

16:57

against her. They must have figures

16:59

making them worried. This doesn't come

17:01

from nowhere. I'm of two minds on

17:03

this one, to be honest with you, Katya. On

17:05

the one hand, we can talk about her influence

17:08

specifically among a demographic that Biden

17:10

is largely lacking support in. That would

17:12

make you think that, yes, if she

17:14

came out in support of President Joe

17:16

Biden for reelection, she could swing some

17:18

valuable voters over to his side. Here's

17:20

the second opinion I have on this.

17:23

She did endorse Joe Biden in 2020.

17:26

And to me, that leads

17:28

me to think that she remains a

17:30

supporter or at least would probably not

17:33

come out and support the Republican candidate,

17:35

whether that's Donald Trump or someone different.

17:37

And so I'm wondering what the mystery is.

17:39

And I'm wondering what the real shock value

17:41

is in her endorsement. The

17:44

second thing I'm wondering is whether people are

17:46

as tuned into something like this as we

17:48

think or whether they're so dug into their

17:50

politics already that hearing an

17:53

endorsement even from somebody as seismically powerful

17:55

as Taylor Swift does not actually hold

17:57

sway for them. I'm wondering what

17:59

other superstitions level are some Donald

18:02

Trump supporters worried because as you were

18:04

explaining with some of the atmosphere at

18:06

Taylor Swift concerts because if Taylor Swift

18:09

likes something, Swifties

18:12

love it. I mean just to get

18:14

a taste of it my colleague Nomiya

18:16

Ekbal has just been to Kansas City

18:19

this week. It's home of the chief,

18:21

the team that Taylor Swift's boyfriend Travis

18:23

Kelsey plays for and she's been speaking

18:25

to football fans and Swifties there. I

18:27

mean together they make up a massive

18:30

chunk of US society. Nomiya sent us

18:32

this voice note from Kansas. Hi

18:34

Katia, in the Kansas City stores lots

18:37

of football fans were buying their t-shirts

18:39

for this weekend's Super Bowl final but

18:41

what really jumped out was all the

18:43

Swift merchandise, red and yellow shirts and

18:45

jumpers those are the football team's colours

18:47

by the way but with the writing

18:49

I'm just here for Taylor and

18:52

if you watch some of the conservative networks

18:54

like Fox News many Donald Trump supporters seem

18:56

to be worried about her political influence. I

18:59

mean she has the source of popularity that

19:01

Donald Trump and Joe Biden dream of. Many

19:04

Swifties I spoke to say they don't

19:06

think people will literally back her candidate

19:08

of choice but that she may

19:10

have the capacity to get young people out to

19:12

vote however for others they

19:15

don't care about the politics. For

19:17

them it's the music and the

19:19

football. It's funny because I'll

19:21

back us up we are

19:23

talking about a blonde-haired, blue-eyed,

19:25

gorgeous country star and

19:28

her uber famous football player

19:30

boyfriend. This is something that

19:32

you would think would actually be very

19:34

popular and very palatable among

19:37

the right wing or the

19:39

Republican Party or the southern

19:41

or middle parts of the United States

19:43

and in fact across all states. If

19:47

we back it up and we zoom out it's

19:49

actually striking that this is such

19:51

a controversy and such a divisive note here.

19:54

Here's what we know. We know that Taylor

19:57

Swift's presence at NFL Games has upped

19:59

viewership especially among women, especially among

20:01

young women and young people. We

20:04

know that that has also increased sponsorship

20:06

and revenue. We know that once

20:08

she attended her first game, sales of

20:10

her boyfriend's jersey spiked. And we

20:13

know that that one game had much

20:15

more viewership, I believe it was something in

20:17

the 60-something percent higher than the same game

20:19

in week three a year prior. That

20:22

influence is real. The other question

20:24

is, do star endorsements really make

20:26

a difference politically? You

20:29

love Taylor Swift, but would it

20:31

change your voting tendency? Oh,

20:33

there's so much that goes into a vote. And

20:36

that's part of why I wonder about the effectiveness

20:38

of these celebrity endorsements. So Katya, let me turn

20:40

it a little bit for you. What

20:43

if an endorsement doesn't convince people to vote for

20:45

a certain candidate, but it convinces them to come

20:47

out and vote? People

20:49

who would have stayed home on that Tuesday in

20:51

November anyway. To me, turnout is

20:53

the big question here, and voter enthusiasm. Whether somebody

20:55

will pick a friend up and go to the

20:57

polls with them, whether somebody will drive their elderly

21:00

parents to the polls, whether someone will put a

21:02

yard sign out in front of their house. Those

21:04

are the kind of things that I think move

21:06

the needle more so than convincing someone to vote

21:08

for a certain candidate because their favorite celebrity will

21:10

do it. It's interesting, isn't it?

21:13

I think normally Taylor Swift is associated

21:15

with teens. But as you were saying

21:17

at the start of this episode, with

21:19

that very useful breakdown of Taylor Swift

21:21

fans, it showed us that the biggest

21:23

chunk of her fan base

21:26

is actually amongst millennial white

21:28

women. Aren't these the kind

21:31

of women who would be voting

21:33

Democrat anyway, according to figures? Yes,

21:35

that is true. It demographically holds

21:37

not just for this election season,

21:39

but for many elections past. But

21:41

let's dive in here because this is bound

21:43

to be a tight election where every vote

21:45

counts. President Biden

21:47

and his reelection bid is underperforming with a

21:50

lot of key demographic groups and some of

21:52

these Taylor Swift fans are among them. We

21:54

know this from a new poll that came

21:56

out from NPR, PBS NewsHour and Marist. President

21:59

Biden won the women's vote in 2020 by

22:01

15 points. What

22:03

does he lead with now? Only

22:05

four points. His margin of support with

22:07

them has narrowed dramatically. He's

22:10

still leading with suburban voters. He's up

22:12

plus 16 there in a hypothetical head-to-head

22:15

matchup with Trump. And

22:17

he leads against Trump by seven points

22:19

with Gen Z and millennial voters. That's

22:21

another core, swiftie demographic right there. And

22:24

it's actually the largest lead he has

22:26

of any demographic group, but younger voters

22:28

largely disapprove of the job President Biden

22:30

is doing in office. Try to

22:33

jibe those two things. That makes for a rough

22:35

picture for President Biden when it

22:37

comes to getting people to come out and cast their

22:39

votes. That is where a celebrity

22:41

endorsement can really come to play. So

22:43

we've established why conservatives close to Donald

22:46

Trump might feel threatened by Taylor Swift's

22:48

power and her popularity and her strength

22:50

of feeling over values and speaking out

22:53

when she chooses to. But

22:55

what I want to know is, is the Biden

22:57

campaign actively wooing her? I

22:59

mean, we know they try to get various

23:01

stars and musicians on board

23:03

in different states around the primaries,

23:06

but is there a swift attack?

23:09

Yeah, you bet. There reportedly is.

23:13

She would be by most reported

23:15

accounts, the endorsement of their wildest

23:17

dreams. She's the top of the list. And

23:20

this is something that candidates go through every

23:22

election cycle, right? They're looking for not just

23:24

the biggest, loudest, most popular voice, but different

23:26

voices. They want people who speak to different

23:28

groups in the population who have that kind

23:30

of influence and can talk about a candidate

23:32

or urge people to go out and vote.

23:35

A really good example is back in July, 2021,

23:38

we saw the pop star Olivia Rodrigo go to

23:41

the White House in, I will

23:43

note, a perfect tweet ensemble. She looked

23:45

incredible. And she met with President Biden

23:47

and his then chief medical advisor, Dr.

23:49

Anthony Fauci, went to the

23:51

White House, recorded a couple of videos to

23:54

boost youth vaccination rates and did

23:56

a back and forth presser in the White House briefing

23:58

room with reporters. That was really... popular. I

24:00

remember that moment vividly and I got a ton

24:02

of play online. That's the kind of thing

24:04

that they want to be able to use celebrities for. So

24:07

I would like to ask your thoughts

24:09

as a Swifty as well as a

24:11

business correspondent and understander of all things

24:13

US politics. I'd like to say let's

24:16

take a guess and a bet and

24:18

the loser has to buy some Taylor

24:20

Swift concert tickets. That would probably break

24:22

the bank. And I kind of have

24:24

a feeling from our conversation. If I

24:26

said to you Taylor Swift,

24:29

will she endorse Joe Biden, yes or no? I

24:31

don't think it's a very big question mark from what I've

24:34

been hearing from you today. You know

24:36

sometimes we like to say it's not

24:38

if but when. That's how

24:40

I feel about this. When would such an

24:42

endorsement be well timed? You know I'd make

24:44

a little side bet with you on that

24:46

one. I tend to think that the Thursday

24:48

night of either party's nominating convention which is

24:50

right before the candidate comes out and speaks

24:52

is the biggest state you have. So I'll

24:54

put a little wager on the table there

24:56

but I'm not springing for tickets. I will

24:58

buy you a collector's

25:00

edition vinyl of the next album. How about that? Okay

25:02

I'll go for that. And I also just want to

25:04

ask you could it be in Taylor Swift's

25:07

mind then we talked about

25:09

the backlash that artists can face when

25:11

they get mixed up in politics. Could

25:14

Taylor Swift be thinking that if she

25:16

doesn't get mixed up in politics this

25:18

presidential year that that could

25:21

lead to a backlash against her from

25:23

a portion of her fans? Yeah I

25:25

think that people are expecting more from

25:28

their celebrities and more from their friends

25:30

and families now amid such a heated

25:32

time in American politics. It's

25:34

a real topic of dinner table

25:36

conversation and out at the bar

25:38

conversation and it's something that really

25:41

divides families and friend groups and

25:43

couples. People feel very emotionally about

25:45

the candidates that they vote for and they

25:47

want to see their own beliefs reflected in

25:49

the people that they respect and they love

25:52

and they want to see that turned around

25:54

vice versa. So that runs

25:56

a very serious chance yeah of

25:58

of hurting her popularity. among her

26:00

fans or at least her fans sitting and

26:02

thinking, well why not? What was the hold

26:04

up? Why didn't you? It's become harder and

26:06

harder to be silent in American politics and

26:09

still view yourself as a leader or an

26:11

influential figure in any realm. That has to

26:13

be something that weighs on her mind as

26:15

well. Erin, a huge pleasure and I'll do

26:17

some more homework on listening to Taylor Swift

26:19

in your honor, thank you. Katya,

26:22

I'm an enormous fan of yours and your show

26:24

so thank you for having me today. Truly.

26:27

And thank you for listening. If you've

26:29

got a question or you want to get

26:31

in touch about this or any other story

26:33

you'd like us to cover, send us a

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plus four four three three zero one

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zero or you can email

26:44

us at theglobalstory at bbc.com.

26:47

Wherever you're listening in the world, this has been

26:49

the Global Story. Goodbye. So

26:55

I hope you enjoyed that episode. Thanks

26:57

to Erin and Katya. If you like

27:00

what you heard, then you can head

27:02

over to the Global Story's podcast feed

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27:06

podcast episodes. It's really worth subscribing. I'll

27:08

see you on America's very soon. Bye.

27:10

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blue Nile dot com. Blue Nile

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dot com. How do you

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make sense of what's really going on

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inside China? Well, how about looking at

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the numbers? I'm Celia

28:08

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Service, I've gathered eight numbers to

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understand China, and some amazing people

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to explain why those numbers matter.

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That's eight numbers to understand China.

28:27

Listen, Ned, by searching for the

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Global News Podcast wherever you

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get your BBC Podcast. How

28:40

do you make sense of what's really

28:42

going on inside China? Well, how about

28:45

looking at the numbers? I'm

28:47

Celia Hatton, Asia Pacific Regional Editor

28:49

for BBC News. And

28:51

in a special programme for the

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Global News Podcast from the BBC

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World Service, I've gathered eight numbers

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to understand China, and some amazing

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people to explain why those numbers

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matter. That's eight numbers

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to understand China. Listen, Ned, by

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searching for the Global News Podcast

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wherever you get your BBC Podcasts.