Prince’s estate has hit back at the Trump campaign after they played one of the late pop icon’s songs at a rally in Minneapolis on Thursday night – despite previously promising that they would not do so.
The star’s 1984 smash ‘Purple Rain’ boomed from the speakers of the Target Center shortly before the President arrived at the venue.
Following the rally – which attended by almost 20,000 people – Prince’s estate took to Twitter to rebuke the campaign for its inclusion of their track.
‘President Trump played Prince’s ‘Purple Rain’ tonight at a campaign event in Minneapolis despite confirming a year ago that the campaign would not use Prince’s music.
Prince’s estate has hit back at the Trump campaign after they played one of the late pop icon’s songs at a rally in Minneapolis on Thursday night. The President is pictured at the rally
Prince’s track Purple Rain boomed from the speakers of the Target Center prior to the kick off of the rally. The estate of the late pop icon – who passed away in 2016 – rebuked Trump’s campaign for using their song
‘The Prince Estate will never give permission to President Trump to use Prince’s songs,’ the tweet stated.
The estate then shared previous correspondence from lawyer, Megan Newton, dated October 2018, which read: ‘We write to confirm the Campaign will not use Prince’s music in connection with its activities going forward.’
Several people left comments in support of Prince’s estate for calling out the Trump campaign’s breach of oath.
One person poked fun at the high turnover in the Trump Administration, by joking that Newton may no longer be associated with the President’s campaign.
The venue was at full capacity on Thursday night, with nearly 20,000 people turning out to see the Commander-in-chief
The estate then shared previous correspondence from lawyer, Megan Newton, dated October 2018, which read: ‘We write to confirm the Campaign will not use Prince’s music in connection with its activities going forward
‘The people you told last year don’t work there any more. You might want to consider just sending them the same memo with a new date every, oh, 6-8 weeks,’ they joked.
However, others had a different point of view.
‘I’m guessing it was just homage to Prince and his being from Minneapolis where the rally was being held. No need for anyone to get bent out of shape about it and cause strife. Accept it as an honor and move on,’ one popular response read.
According to The Washington Post, ‘politicians generally have the right to use songs at rallies as long as they get a “blanket license” for the artist’s entire catalog’ from licensing companies.
However, Prince’s estate aren’t the only ones to go after Trump for having their songs used at his rallies.
Rihanna and Pharrell Williams have both blasted the Commander-in-chief.
President Trump’s posting of a parody video mocking former VP Joe Biden was taken down from Twitter last week after complaints from Canadian band Nickelback
Meanwhile, Canadian group Nickelback last week objected to Trump’s use of their song ‘Photograph’ in a Tweet used to ridicule his 2020 rival, Joe Biden.
After Biden claimed he hadn’t spoken about his son Hunter’s controversial foreign corporate ties, Trump unearthed a snap of the former vice president and his son playing golf with a Devon Archer.
Archer is a former business partner of Hunter’s, and both men served on the board of a Ukranian gas company which was being investigated for corruption.
Trump paired the seemingly-incriminating picture with the Nickeblack song, which includes the lyrics: ‘Look at this photograph, every time I do it makes me laugh’.
After complaints from Nickelback, Twitter quickly removed the video.
Trump supporters deluged Twitter with their own posts of the video and the hashtag ‘#ParodyIsFairUse’ – which trended on the social media platform.
The video Trump posted included a clip of Biden denying he had ever spoken with his son Hunter about his foreign business ties
The Trump video’s creator took footage from the Nickelback music video and inserted a group photo including Biden and his son Hunter along with a third man (at left), Devon Archer, who was Hunter Biden’s business partner and co-board-member at a Ukrainian gas company