UPDATE (August 21st @ 9:53pm ET): Donald Trump's campaign video featuring Beyoncé's “Freedom” has been deleted from Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung's X account.
ORIGINAL STORY (August 21st @ 7:55pm ET): Beyoncé's record company and music publisher sent a cease and desist Donald Trumphis presidential campaign for using the superstar's song “Freedom” in a social media video; Bulletin board has confirmed. The news was first reported by Rolling Stone.
In the offending quote, which was posted to the Trump campaign's spokesperson Stephen ChungX's account, “Freedom” plays over footage of the Republican presidential candidate exiting a plane. The video arrived long after the song had become the official theme song for the Democratic presidential candidate's campaign Kamala Harris and her candidate Tim Walzwith Vice President Harris playing the song at her first campaign rally earlier this summer after Pres. Joe Biden withdrew from the race and endorsed her candidacy. Use of the track by the Harris-Walz campaign, including in multiple campaign ads and at the Democratic National Convention, was with Beyoncé's permission.
As of this writing, the Trump video using “Freedom” remains on Cheung's X account.
This is far from the first time Trump has slammed an artist for using his song at campaign events and elsewhere without permission. On August 11, attorneys for the estate of Isaac Hayes filed a notice of copyright infringement and threatened further legal action against the Trump campaign over the use of Hayes' “Hold On, I'm Coming” at several Trump rallies without license between 2022 and 2024. Other artists who have objected to Trump's use of their songs over the years include The Rolling Stones, Rihanna, Adele and Aerosmith's Steven Tyler.
