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There’s been a lot of talk these days about celebrity endorsements and their purported value. Model Amber Rose’s transphobic endorsement of Donald Trump, as well as others from rappers Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow, should have people asking: Should voters even care who these people are, let alone what they think about politics?
Donald Trump has long depended on endorsements from celebrities and influencers in lieu of reputable experts and political figures, who’ve largely abandoned his political campaign (if they ever joined up) — perhaps because endorsements from celebrities, no matter how obscure, suit Trump’s authoritarian goal of promoting the cult of personality he's built around himself.
Apart from the explicitly pro-Trump group, others celebrities, like rapper Cardi B, have been dragged for their fence-sitting.
But on the subject of celebrity endorsements, singer John Legend shared some wisdom during an episode of Pod Save America: Be careful what you wish for. “I think fans and audiences should be careful about wanting us to weigh in on everything, because honestly, like — no,” Legend said.
When host Jon Favreau suggested that the lack of efficacy in announcing their support might be a reason for celebs to remain silent, Legend elaborated:
Yeah, the efficacy. But also, like, the depth and the breadth of understanding necessary to contribute meaningfully to the conversation is actually, like, just not there for most artists. And you can’t really blame them. This is not what they do everyday. They’re musicians, they’re actors, they’re in the public eye, and you want them to use that platform for good. But also, you want them to do it with a sense of knowledge and understanding and wisdom and connection to activists and organizers and experts. And everybody’s just not able to do that. And so I think we all as fans should be careful what we ask them to do, because you might not get what you’re wanting out of that conversation and engagement.
You can watch the clip here:
Legend is a longtime associate of Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, so he knows firsthand how even the well-intentioned welcoming of some celebrities into the political sphere can go horribly wrong.
Ye, in fact, seems like the perfect example to highlight. His outspoken enthusiasm for Trump in 2016 and 2018 (which appears to remain undiminished) certainly didn’t lead to the groundswell of support for Trump among Black voters that right-wingers seem to think it would. Ye — inarguably one of the best-known celebrities in the world — wasn’t even able to conjure up support for his own beleaguered bid for president in 2020 (which was rumored to be a scheme to help Trump win by pulling Black votes from Joe Biden).
But there are other examples of ineffective endorsements: Beyoncé endorsed Beto O’Rourke, a Democrat, in her home state of Texas in 2018 against Republican Sen. Ted Cruz. And that same year Taylor Swift endorsed Democratic Senate candidate Phil Bredesen's effort to oust Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee. Both O'Rourke and Bredesen lost, and the celebrity endorsements seemed hardly to have moved the needle.
USA Today and Suffolk University actually released polling data this month that showed most people don't rely on celebrity endorsements to decide their vote, and the celebrities who wield the most influence are political figures themselves: former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama.
Take a look at the list and you’ll find data that shows some celebrities whose endorsement appears just as likely to turn voters away from the endorsed candidate as it is to draw voters toward that candidate.
I don’t think any of this means celebrities shouldn’t speak out on political matters — or that the insignificance of a celebrity’s endorsement should give them a pass for, say, backing (or being indifferent to) the rise of authoritarian candidates like Trump. But we ought to temper our expectations about the power of celebrity endorsements, and should perhaps credit many voters with knowing on some level that being popular doesn’t make anyone an expert on politics.