Monday night (August 26), MTV held their annual Video Music Awards, this year at the Prudential Center in New Jersey.
Taylor Swift was one of the night’s biggest winners taking home Video for Good and Video of the Year awards.
Presenting Video of the Year, Queen Latifah and John Travolta announced that Swift’s “You Need To Calm Down” was the winner, completely shocking the former country singer. She brought up several people who starred in her video to accept the award with her including singer/actor/dancer Todrick Hall, model Dexter Mayfield, YouTuber Hannah Hart, drag queens Jade Jolie, Riley Knoxx, and Adore Delano, as well as the video’s director Drew Kirsch.
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After receiving her moon person, she said, “I just want to say that this is a fan voted award, so I first want to say thank you to the fans, because in this video, several points were made. So you voting for this video means that you want a world where we are all treated equally under the law regardless of who we love or how we identify.”
Swift continued, “At the end of the video there was a petition and there still is a petition for the Equality Act which basically says we all deserve equal rights under the law. And I want to thank everyone who signed that petition because it now has half a million signatures which is five times the amount that it would need to warrant a response from The White House.”
The “Lover” singer then looked at her wrist, basically saying she’s been waiting for The White House’s response, but she hasn’t heard from them yet.
The Equality Act Swift is fighting for is an amendment to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which will add “sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes under federal civil rights law,” according to The Heritage Foundation.
Because of her public statement, Deputy Press Secretary Judd Deere was asked on Tuesday (August 27) what the Trump administration’s stance on her issue.
“The Trump administration absolutely opposes discrimination of any kind and supports the equal treatment of all; however, the House-passed bill in its current form is filled with poison pills that threaten to undermine parental and conscience rights,” Deere said, according to CNN.
Kellyanne Conway made an appearance on Fox News on Tuesday, singing Swift’s own lyrics from “You Need To Calm Down” as a response. Watch it below.