The Pentagon has slammed Fox News host Jesse Watters after he said Taylor Swift could be a “psy-op” for the US government.
During Tuesday’s Jesse Watters Primetime, the Fox News host played a video that he falsely claimed showed a Department of Defense official suggesting Taylor Swift was a Pentagon psy-op for combating misinformation.
“I like her music,” Mr Watters began the segment by saying. “She’s all right, but I mean, have you ever wondered why or how she blew up like this?” he asked.
“Well, around four years ago, the Pentagon psychological operations unit floated turning Taylor Swift into an asset during a Nato meeting. What kind of asset? A PsyOp for combating online misinformation.”
He then went on to show a video of what he claimed was a female Defense Department official giving a presentation on stage to Nato officials in 2019.
“You came in here wanting to understand how you just go out and counter the information operation,” the woman could be heard saying in the video.
“The idea is that social influence can help– can help encourage or promote behavior change… So, potentially as like a peaceful information operation… I include Taylor Swift in here because she’s– she’s, you know, a fairly influential online person. I don’t know if you’ve heard of her.”
After playing the clip ended, Mr Watters told viewers: “Yeah, that’s real. Pentagon’s PsyOp unit pitched Nato on turning Taylor Swift into an asset.”
But on Wednesday, the Pentagon shut down Mr Watters’ claim.
“As for this conspiracy theory, we are going to shake it off,” Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh said in a statement to Politico, referencing one of Swift’s biggest hits.
“But that does highlight that we still need Congress to approve our supplemental budget request as Swift-ly as possible so we can be out of the woods with potential fiscal concerns,” Ms Singh added.
Fox News has been accused of pushing a conspiracy theory that Taylor Swift could be used in a government psy-op— (Fox News)
The woman giving the presentation in the video shown by Mr Watters was not a Pentagon employee.
Her name is Alicia Marie Bargar, a research engineer in applied physics at Johns Hopkins University who has no known contracts with or relationship to the US military.
In the video, Ms Bargar was presenting research she had conducted with her team at Johns Hopkins University about how information spreads online.
During the presentation, she discussed hypothetical scenarios for how information can be manipulated, using Taylor Swift as an example, owing to her status as potentially the most famous pop star in the world.
The video shown by Mr Watters on his show was also heavily edited and was only a three-minute segment of the full presentation. In a segment of the presentation not included on his show, Ms Bargar explained that Swift had used her platform to tangibly influence voter turnout.
She showed a screenshot from an Instagram post where Swift showed herself waiting in line to vote back in 2016 – a post that was credited with increasing voter turnout amongst young people.
“Celebrities, at least in the US, regularly will post pictures of themselves with an encouragement for people to go vote and this has a measurable affect on voter turnout,” Ms Bargar said.
Vote.org chief Andrea Hailey, who Swift has previously partnered with to encourage young people to register to vote, also responded to Mr Watters’ accusations.
“Not a psy-op or a Pentagon asset,” she wrote on X. “Just the biggest nonpartisan platform in America helping young people register & cast their vote.”
In a 2016 Instgram post, Swift showed herself waiting in line to vote— (Taylor Swift/Instagram)
Swift has long been accused by relatively fringe elements, including the X account known as End Wokeness, to be a psy-op, with the conspiracy theory gaining more prominence afterTime magazine named Swift as 2023 person of the year.
“Taylor Swift has a cult-like following that would drink poisoned Kool Aid for her. The media knows this and is feeding it,” End Wokeness tweeted around a month ago.
“Music. Entertainment. Sports. Now they crowned her Person of the Year. The next step? Politics. If you don’t think the regime has plans to weaponize her just in time for 2024, you clearly have not been paying attention,” the account added.
Elon Musk, the owner of X, has frequently engaged with the account’s content.
Former Trump administration officials, including former senior adviser Stephen Miller, have also pushed the conspiracy theory.
“What’s happening with Taylor Swift is not organic,” Mr Miller tweeted in December.
