Taylor Swift-NFL conspiracies grow leading up to Super Bowl

Former GOP presidential candidate among those circulating plot twists involving Swift, Chiefs, Biden campaign

As the Kansas City Chiefs prepare for their fourth Super Bowl appearance in five years, this one carries a fresh twist.

With musical superstar Taylor Swift and Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce involved in a widely-publicized personal relationship, even former Republican presidential candidate and tech millionaire Vivek Ramaswamy circulated a conspiracy theory that involved the Chiefs and President Joe Biden's re-election campaign.

"I wonder who’s going to win the Super Bowl next month," Ramaswamy posted on X on January 29 in response to a message about Swift, the 2023 Time Person of the Year and one of most popular musicians in history with 12 Grammy Awards. "And I wonder if there’s a major presidential endorsement coming from an artificially culturally propped-up couple this fall."

Swift endorsed Biden in 2020 but has not given any indication of support this time. She has attended most of the Chiefs' football games this season, including the last two playoff wins.

Conservative podcaster Mike Crispi claimed that Swift would announce she was endorsing Biden during the Super Bowl half-time show on February 11 in Las Vegas. "Everyone who thinks Taylor Swift won’t heroically parachute into the stadium at the Super Bowl, straight off the jet from her Japan tour are absolute sheep," posted Crispi, a financial services business owner who unsuccessfully ran for a Congress seat in New Jersey in 2022. "Taylor’s coming. [Neither] she, nor the NFL, are passing up the money. She’s endorsing Biden. It’s rigged."

Former Hollywood lawyer Rogan O’Handley charged that if the Chiefs won the Super Bowl, Swift and Kelce would "tour the country as 'world champions' helping elect Joe Biden." World War III "will likely follow" in a second Biden term, and "millions will die," the Donald Trump supporter claimed. "The fate of the free world rests upon your shoulders," he said to the San Francisco 49ers, the Chiefs' opponents in the Super Bowl.

Pop star Taylor Swift performs during her Eras Tour in Texas in 2023.Photo byRonald Woan / Wikimedia Creative Commons

Claims that NFL helping Chiefs for ratings, money

Some sports fans have steered clear of political overtones, focusing on economic conspiracy theories to explain the Chiefs' success so far this season.

Apex Marketing Group recently estimated that the brand value of Swift's relationship with Kelce, including new fans watching and attending NFL games and buying merchandise like jerseys, was worth $331.5 million to the league. Some speculated that NFL officials have been instructed by the league to make favorable calls for the Chiefs and unfavorable ones against opponents so that Kansas City made the Super Bowl, usually the most watched sporting event of the year.

In the AFC title game on January 28, officials assessed the Baltimore Ravens with 95 yards worth of penalties, affecting several drives and scoring chances. The Chiefs were only penalized for 30 yards.

Generally, officials try not to directly favor one team over another, particularly in conference championship games. The 65-yard penalty difference was the largest margin by far for an AFC title game in the past six years. The previous largest was a 33-yard variance between the New England Patriots and Chiefs in 2019.

Ravens fans said officials missed "obvious" Chiefs penalties. "For every missed call you find for the Chiefs, I bet I can find two missed calls for the Ravens," said one.

The situation led to some tense moments after the Baltimore game. Former NFL quarterback and CBS broadcaster Boomer Esiason said he almost physically fought with a Ravens fan who angrily argued that the NFL was "rigged" in comments with Esiason and former coach Bill Cowher.

There were also tense moments before the game. In one exchange, Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and Kelce kicked and tossed aside practice tees and balls that Ravens kicker Justin Tucker was using to warm up. Tucker explained that he has warmed up on both sides of the field for 12 years, and this was the first time he recalled there was a problem.

"For those that don't know the way it works is each team's kicker goes to the other team's designated warm-up area on the field," Tucker said. "And for me, it's usually about 90 minutes before kickoff."

Mahomes, Kelce, and others apparently came out to warm up well ahead of time. "That's just kind of the way we've always done it and the way kickers around the league have always done it," said Tucker, a member of the Ravens' 2013 Super Bowl championship team who holds the NFL record for best career field goal percentage [90.2%] and the longest field goal [66 yards]. "It’s not like I’m out there trying to be problematic. I’m just trying to get ready for the football game just like they are."

Mahomes, a two-time Super Bowl MVP and six-time Pro Bowler, and Kelce, a nine-time Pro Bowler and two-time Super Bowl champ, blamed Tucker for the conflict. Mahomes claimed on a radio program that he had only faced "occasions where there’s been a kicker that wasn’t necessarily moving out the way" three times in seven years of warming up before games. "It was in Baltimore all three times," Mahomes said. "[Tucker] does a little stuff, I think, to try to get under our skin."

Kelce was more vulgar, calling Tucker a "f---ing d----" on a podcast. "Don't make me as the bad guy," Kelce said. "He was poking the bear." He added that had Tucker missed a field goal, Kelce would have sprinted onto the field to taunt him.

Ravens coach John Harbaugh said Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker was on the Ravens' side of the field during the pregame, "doing the exact same thing in the exact same spot" without any problems.

Not listening to 'outside noise'

Many football fans say they don't care about who Kelce dates, just that the references to Swift take away from their enjoyment of the game.

Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce and musical star Taylor Swift said they tune out the "outside noise."Photo byX screenshot

For their part, Kelce and Swift don't seem to much care that people have a problem with their relationship, which began well before Swift attended her initial Chiefs' game earlier this season.

“This all started when Travis very adorably put me on blast on his podcast, which I thought was metal as hell,” Swift told Time. “We started hanging out right after that. So we actually had a significant amount of time that no one knew, which I’m grateful for, because we got to get to know each other. By the time I went to that first game, we were a couple."

They embrace the public nature of their relationship, she said. "We’re showing up for each other, other people are there and we don’t care. The opposite of that is you have to go to an extreme amount of effort to make sure no one knows that you’re seeing someone. And we’re just proud of each other.”

They have been able to block out the conspiracy talk, said Kelce, who some on social media derisively called "Mr. Swift."

"The only thing we've talked about is as long as we're happy, we can't listen to anything that's outside noise," Kelce said during a media conference on January 26. "That's all that matters."