Woodkid – Photo: Facebook; Donald Trump – Photo: Fulton County Sheriff’s Office
French singer-songwriter Woodkid is calling out Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump’s campaign for using his song “Run Boy Run” at rallies.
Woodkid, whose real name is Yoann Lemoine, previously criticized the campaign in December for releasing a two-minute video, featuring images of soldiers and anti-vaccine demonstrators alongside clips of Trump’s speeches, as the artist’s 2012 single plays in the background.
According to Euro News, the Trump campaign has played that video featuring Woodkid’s song, or sometimes just the song alone, at Trump’s rallies. And despite the artist’s objections, the Trump campaign re-released the video from December on Trump’s social media platform, Truth Social.
On August 7, Woodkid took to X to protest the campaign’s use of his music.
“Once again, I never authorized the use of my music on this @realDonaldTrump film,” he wrote.
Once again, I never gave permission for the use of my music on that @realDonaldTrump film.
Run Boy Run is a LGBT+ anthem wrote by me, a proud LGBT+ musician. How ironic.
Please react and don’t be complicit @UMusicFrance
Woodkid also urged his label, Universal Music France, to “react and don’t be complicit” by allowing Trump’s use of the song to go unchallenged.
“Run Boy Run” is an anthem about transformation and the pursuit of personal freedom. It is about a misfit who must break free from rigid societal norms. Woodkid has previously said the song is inspired by his experiences as a gay man.
In 2016, Woodkid spoke out against anti-gay marriage demonstrators in France for playing the song during their rallies. “It’s the Middle Ages aspect of my music that must have appealed to them.”
Many U.S. politicians have cribbed songs from popular artists for use at their campaign rallies, usually by buying licensing packages from music rights organizations, which give them legal access to millions of songs. However, artists — and more importantly, their labels — do have the right to demand the music be removed from the list of available songs.
Several other artists have previously blasted the Trump campaign for using their music without permission, including Adele, Rihanna, The White Stripes, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler, Pharrell Williams, Bruce Springsteen, Linkin Park, and Elton John. All have either demanded the Trump campaign stop using their music without permission or disavowed the use of their songs at pro-Trump rallies.
As Euro News notes, the estates of Leonard Cohen, Beatles guitarist George Harrison, Sinéad O’Connor, Isaac Hayes, Prince, Tom Petty, and Luciano Pavarotti have also objected to the campaign’s use of the artists’ music for campaign rallies.
In 2020, Victor Willis, the lead singer of the disco-era group the Village People asked the then-president to stop playing the group’s songs “Macho Man” and “Y.M.C.A.” in protest of his threat to use the U.S. military to shut down protests against racism and police brutality, including those organized by the Black Lives Matter movement.
The Trump administration canceled at least 68 grants to 46 institutions, totaling about $40 million, that had been awarded to study issues related to LGBTQ health.
Some of the grant money was already spent, but at least $1.36 million -- and likely more -- in future support has been pulled as part of the Trump administration's efforts to target what it calls "ideologically-driven" science.
That is part of a larger effort to purge the federal government of -- and to pressure the private sector to eliminate -- diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and programs, including anything that acknowledges the existence of transgender identity.
Defying an executive order from President Donald Trump, a federal judge blocked the U.S. Department of Justice from transferring 12 transgender female inmates to male prisons.
The Bureau of Prisons was slated to relocate the inmates to comply with a Trump executive order stating that the U.S. government will only recognize two sexes, male and female, as valid.
That executive order also pledged to ban people assigned male at birth from accessing female-designated spaces, including single-sex accommodations in prisons.
The executive order also prohibits federal funds from being used for any medical treatment, procedure, or drug that would assist an inmate in transitioning or changing their outward appearance in a way that would not align with their assigned sex at birth.
The Pentagon will start forcibly discharging transgender service members within 60 days unless an individual can obtain a special waiver to allow them to continue serving.
On Wednesday, February 26, the Pentagon issued a policy memo outlining how the U.S. Department of Defense is complying with an executive order by President Trump to prohibit transgender individuals from serving openly in the U.S. military.
Trump's executive order claims that allowing transgender people to serve in the Armed Forces threatens military readiness and undermines unit cohesion.
It contradicts a 2016 RAND Corporation study, commissioned by the Pentagon, that found allowing transgender members to serve openly had no negative impact on unit cohesion, operational effectiveness, or readiness.
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