The veteran rocker, Bruce Springsteen, a longtime political opponent of the president, emerged last week as one of Trump’s most prominent cultural critics by lashing out at him from a British stage.
As usual, Trump is hitting back hard. He’s calling Springsteen “highly overrated” and “dumb as a rock,” and even dragging Beyoncé into the dispute.
On Monday, May 19, the president suggested that Springsteen and Beyoncé should be investigated to see whether the appearances they made on behalf of his Democratic rival Kamala Harris late last year amounted to illegal campaign donations.
Opening a tour in Manchester, England, Springsteen told his audience last Thursday (May 15) that,
“The America I love, the America I’ve written about and that has been a beacon of hope and freedom for 250 years, is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent, and traitorous government.”
He added: “Tonight, we ask all who believe in democracy and the best of our American experiment to rise with us, raise their voices against authoritarianism, and let freedom ring out.”
And the exchange of insults began.
Springsteen later referred to an “unfit president and a rogue government” that “have no interest in or idea of what it means to be deeply American.”
The next morning, Trump called Springsteen vastly overrated. “I never liked him, never liked his music or his radical leftist politics, and, more importantly, he’s not a talented guy, just a persistent, obnoxious jerk,” he wrote on social media.
“This dried out prune of a rocker (his skin is all atrophied) ought to KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT until he gets back in the Country,” he said.
The following night, also in Manchester, Springsteen repeated his criticisms.
“It’s no surprise what Springsteen’s political leanings are and have been for many decades,” said veteran music writer Alan Light, author of “Don’t Stop: Why We (Still) Love Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours,” a forthcoming book. “He’s someone who has spoken out loud in his music and his actions.”
The Chief’s statements this week showed he wasn’t afraid to speak out “at a time when so many people and institutions are simply giving in,” Light added.
Springsteen is no stranger to this game.
This isn’t the first time Springsteen has spoken out against Trump, or a Republican president.
When former President Ronald Reagan referenced Springsteen’s “message of hope” at a campaign stop during the height of the rocker’s Born in the USA popularity, Springsteen wondered if Reagan had heard his music and its references to those left behind by the 1980s economy.
He has also had a sometimes difficult relationship with Chris Christie, the former Republican presidential candidate and governor of New Jersey, a fan of his music.
Springsteen has campaigned for Trump’s opponents, including Harris late last year. In 2020, he said that “a good portion of our beautiful country, in my opinion, has been thoroughly hypnotised, brainwashed by a con man from Queens.”
He knows the reference to that New York borough still rankled for a man who built his own tower in Manhattan and ascended to the presidency. Trump often stays at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. Springsteen grew up in New Jersey—as you may have heard—and now lives in Colts Neck, that state.
Trump doesn’t hesitate to attack the biggest names in music who speak out against him, such as Beyoncé and Taylor Swift. But the political risk may be lower; their younger, more female audiences are less likely to be representative of Trump’s core base of supporters.
Throughout his career, Springsteen has raised political issues with his audience beyond presidential endorsements. His 1995 album, The Ghost of Tom Joad, powerfully documented the lives of struggling immigrants, including Mexicans and Vietnamese.
And his 2001 song, American Skin (41 Shots), criticised the shooting of an unarmed Guinean immigrant named Amadou Diallo by New York City police officers, which angered some in the working-class segments of his fan base.
Clearly, Springsteen has conservative fans and some who wish he would stay away from politics, Light observed. Still, “40 years later, it’s hard to imagine what they think would happen” with Trump, he added.
Although Trump made a point of addressing Springsteen’s criticism of him at a show abroad, he and the E Street Band haven’t performed in the United States since before the 2024 election. Their tour last year focused heavily on themes of mortality, less so on politics.
He has several European tour dates scheduled this year through July and hasn’t announced any new shows at home.