Recently, Fox News host Jesse Watters, who now helms a more prominent show following the semi-recent, abrupt departure of longtime figurehead Tucker Carlson, suggested the pop star Taylor Swift could be a secret agent of the federal government. A guest of his — ostensibly a former agent in the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) — suggested Swift could be being used somehow without even her knowing, though it wasn’t fully clear how that would work!
The Defense Department, which Watters specifically named in explanations of the conspiracy theory on his show, pushed back in prepared remarks shared with POLITICO. “As for this conspiracy theory, we are going to shake it off,” spokeswoman Sabrina Singh said, referencing here and in the following some of the singer’s most well-known music. “But that does highlight that we still need Congress to approve our supplemental budget request as Swift-ly as possible so we can be out of the woods with potential fiscal concerns.”
Watters and his guest, a man named Stuart Kaplan, pointed to Swift recently promoting the cause of voter registration — a foundational, frequent process in electoral politics across the entire United States. In other words, there’s no indication of a covert agenda here!
Amid discussions in the House and Senate on funding, Republicans have been pushing for border wins — and, at least in one corner, arguable wins only of the sort that hew extremely closely to their own proposals, though the divided (in partisan terms) nature of the federal government at present somewhat necessitates cooperation across party lines! Specifically, the Biden admin also proposed $14 billion in funding for border efforts, which would include the hiring of additional personnel across multiple federal agencies serving the area. Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), currently Speaker of the House, has outright rejected the prospect of that funding, characterizing it as somehow falling short of what is actually needed. He was confrontational towards the idea of additional funding at all.
