Ariana Grande has hit back at the White House after one of her songs was used in a TikTok post promoting immigration arrests carried out by ICE.
Earlier this week, the official White House TikTok account uploaded footage showing people being handcuffed and detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. The video was set to Grande’s track ‘Bye’ and accompanied by the caption: “Bye-bye. President Trump has delivered the most secure border in history.”
Days later, Grande reportedly responded directly beneath the post, condemning the use of her music. She wrote: “Please do not ever use my music in relation to this barbaric, inhumane, heinous nonsense. F*** ICE.”
However, by Friday (12 June), the comment was no longer visible on the video. Grande’s representatives later confirmed to Variety that she had left the message, but said that “for some reason it’s not publicly visible”.
The clip has also since been stripped of its original soundtrack. At the time of writing, TikTok displays a notice stating: “This sound isn’t available.”
Responding to Grande’s criticism, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told Indy100: “We’ll say this one last time: what’s actually barbaric, inhumane, and heinous are the criminal illegal aliens who have injured and murdered innocent American citizens.”
Grande is not the first artist to object to the White House using their music in immigration-related social media content.
Last year, Sabrina Carpenter spoke out after her song ‘Juno’ featured in a similar White House video. Reacting on X/Twitter, she wrote: “Do not ever involve me or my music to benefit your inhumane agenda.”
Jackson later fired back, saying: “Here’s a Short n’ Sweet message for Sabrina Carpenter: we won’t apologize for deporting dangerous criminal illegal murderers, rapists, and pedophiles from our country. Anyone who would defend these sick monsters must be stupid, or is it slow?”
Indy100 reached out to Ariana Grande’s representative for comment
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