Donald Trump urges supporters to back country singer Jason Aldean calling him a ‘fantastic guy’ who has a ‘great new song’ – amid controversy over lyrics and video being filmed at a lynching site
- Former President Donald Trump is backing country singer Jason Aldean
- Aldean is facing controversy over his Try That In A Small Town music video
- Critics are calling him out for glorifying gun use after he survived the Las Vegas shooting and filming it on the site of a lynching
Former President Donald Trump urged his supporters to back country singer Jason Aldean, who is embroiled in a scandal over a song and new music video.
The Republican ex-president took to Truth Social overnight Thursday to praise Aldean’s single, Try That In A Small Town, which was released in May, but the video dropped Friday.
Aldean has been criticized for the lyrics of the song – that suggest small town ‘good ol’ boys’ will use the ‘gun that my granddad gave me’ on carjackers and robbers – but also those who ‘cuss out a cop’ and ‘stomp on the flag and light it up.’
The video was shot in front of the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee – the site of a 1927 mob lynching of an 18-year-old black man named Henry Choate and the site of a race riot in 1946.
‘Jason Aldean is a fantastic guy who just came out with a great new song. Support Jason all the way. MAGA!!!’ Trump posted to Truth.
Former President Donald Trump voiced his support for embattled country singer Jason Aldean, who is facing criticism over a new music video
Trump backed Aldean in an overnight tweet Thursday, calling him a ‘fantastic guy who just came out with a great new song’
Aldean’s video has already been pulled by Country Music Television, with the network giving no official reason for the move.
Gun control activists, however, expressed disgust at the lyrics, especially because Aldean survived the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas – where 61 people were gunned down and more than 400 were wounded in the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.
‘Hey, Jason. I was also there at Route 91. While you were being protected by your security team I was on the ground watching someone bleed out. So how about you have some class and respect for the victims and survivors and what we go through every day and just stfu. Thanks,’ said Twitter user @Ninergirl99.
Singer Sheryl Crow publicly bashed Aldean’s message.
‘I’m from a small town,’ she noted. ‘Even people in small towns are sick of violence. There’s nothing small-town or American about promoting violence. You should know that better than anyone having survived a mass shooting. This is not American or small town-like. It’s just lame.’
Tennessee state Rep. Justin Jones, who was briefly expelled from the body by his Republican colleagues over protesting on behalf of stricter gun laws in the aftermath of mass shooting at the Covenant School in Nashville, said, ‘As Tennessee lawmakers, we have an obligation to condemn Jason Aldean’s heinous song calling for racist violence.’
‘What a shameful vision of gun extremism and vigilantism. We will continue to call for common sense gun laws, that protect ALL our children and communities,’ Jones said.
Jason Aldean’s video was shot in front of the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee – the site of a 1927 mob lynching of an 18-year-old black man named Henry Choate and the site of a race riot in 1946
Aldean put out a lengthy statement on Twitter Tuesday saying that the accusations – especially those suggesting racism – went ‘too far.’
‘In the past 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a pro-lynching song (a song that has been out since May) and was subject to the comparison that I (direct quote) was not too pleased with the nationwide BLM protests,’ he wrote. ‘These references are not only meritless, but dangerous.’
‘There is not a single lyric in the song that references race or points to it – and there isn’t a single video clip that isn’t real news footage – and while I can try and respect others to have their own interpretation of a song with music – this one goes too far,’ he said.
The video shows Aldean and his band playing in front of the courthouse.
Footage is then spliced throughout the music video that purports to show crimes being committed and urban unrest, similar to the Black Lives Matter demonstrations that followed the 2020 police killing of George Floyd.
Jason Aldean (left) and his wife Brittany (right) have attended former President Donald Trump’s New Year’s Eve parties at Mar-a-Lago. Here they’re pictured on New Year’s Eve 2023
Trump gives Brittany Aldean (right) a kiss on the forehead with Jason (left) at her side, as the couple rang in 2023 with the former president at Mar-a-Lago
Online sleuths, including TikTok user Destinee Stark, found that some of the imagery, including a woman giving officers the middle finger and someone throwing a Molotov cocktail was not filmed in the U.S. or stock footage, respectively.
Trump’s support of Aldean was unsurprising as the country star and his wife Brittany have spent time with the former president, even attending his New Year’s Eve parties at Mar-a-Lago.
Aldean has also been spotted golfing with Trump.
The former president condemned the Black Lives Matter demonstrations in 2020.
He countered them by pushing a ‘law and order’ message as he was running for reelection, backing law enforcement over those protesting police brutality against black Americans.
The ex-president was also unsympathetic to calls to remove Confederate monuments, saying they represented the U.S.’s ‘heritage’ and not a racist past.
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