Trump Drags Taylor Swift Into His Creepy Sydney Sweeney Take

If you thought the “Sydney Sweeney made an allegedly eugenicist jeans ad and is also a registered Republican” discourse would simply peter out, you clearly don’t know August news cycles — or Donald Trump. Our current president can’t stand it when Americans are focused on a “hot topic” that doesn’t directly involve him. So it’s no surprise that he weighed in, declaring in a Monday morning Truth Social post, “Sydney Sweeney, a registered Republican, has the ‘HOTTEST’ ad out there.”

But let’s give the president some points for creativity. No one would have predicted that he’d connect the Euphoria star to his old beef with Taylor Swift, like he’s playing an all-MAGA version of six degrees of Kevin Bacon:

If you are thinking, But … Taylor Swift is the hottest artist in the world right now, allow me to translate out of Trumpese. Yes, according to multiple metrics — from Spotify streaming data to Grammy awards to polling on the most famous celebrities — Taylor Swift is still incredibly popular. But several months ago, Trump declared that Swift is actually “no longer ‘HOT’” and it’s all thanks to him:

This is a reference to yet another Trump Truth Social post. When Swift endorsed Kamala Harris in September 2024, despite Trump’s multiple attempts to win her over, he retaliated by posting “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!”

So what does any of this have to do with Sydney Sweeney? Nothing really. Trump is just making the spurious argument that he is the arbiter of who is “hot” and who is “not.” In our “emperor’s new clothes”-esque environment, that’s enough to give American Eagle’s stock a little boost, as CNBC reported:

Shortly after Trump’s post, shares of American Eagle surged, and just before 11 a.m. ET, were still trading more than 15% higher.

… over the past week, shares of the company have been down as American Eagle has faced criticism that the campaign was sexist and out of touch. That slump rebounded on Monday when Trump weighed in on the discourse.

As of Friday’s close, shares of American Eagle were down more than 27% so far this year as the company grapples with larger macroeconomic concerns related to tariffs, consumer spending and its own merchandising missteps. 

Will that translate into American Eagle jeans actually “flying off the shelves”? Probably not. But the Trump post is still impressive, in a way. By adding in a 79-year-old man weighing in on the relative “hotness” of two attractive younger women, Trump managed to make the already creepy, Nazi-adjacent American Eagle discourse even worse.