December 3, 2025 — 9:11am
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The White House has used songstress Sabrina Carpenter’s own lyrics to hit back against her after the star took aim at its use of her song Juno as a soundtrack for social media videos of United States’ Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids.
The spat marks yet another dust-up between Donald Trump’s administration and high-profile musicians over the unauthorised use of their music for political purposes.
Sabrina Carpenter, pictured here in September, hit out at the White House’s use of her song in a video promoting ICE raids. The White House hit back with a statement using Carpenter’s own lyrics against her.Evan Agostini/Invision/AP
It began on Tuesday, when the White House shared footage to X (formerly Twitter), of various people, visibly distressed, running from or being confronted and arrested by ICE agents.
Set to Carpenter’s hit Juno, the video was captioned with lyrics referring to the songstress’ invitation to “try out some freaky positions”.
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“Have you ever tried this one? Bye-bye,” the post read.
Carpenter then lashed the use of her song for the post.
“This video is evil and disgusting,” she wrote on Wednesday morning on X in response.
“Do not ever involve me or my music to benefit your inhumane agenda.”
White House deputy press secretary Abigail Jackson then responded to Carpenter’s criticism in a statement laced with references to Carpenter’s 2024 album, Short n’ Sweet, and lyrics from her August album’s lead single, Manchild.
“Here’s a Short n’ Sweet message for Sabrina Carpenter: we won’t apologise for deporting dangerous criminal illegal murderers, rapists and paedophiles from our country,” Jackson said. “Anyone who would defend these sick monsters must be stupid, or is it slow?”
Trump’s team has featured songs in social media videos without the artists’ approval going right back to 2015, when R.E.M. slammed the then-presidential candidate’s use of It’s the End of the World as We Know It. Beyonce, Rihanna, Phil Collins, Steve Tyler, Neil Young, the Foo Fighters and The Rolling Stones have all at various times objected to their music being used.
Most recently, in November, Olivia Rodrigo called out the United States’ Department of Homeland Security for using her song, All-American Bitch, in a video asking undocumented immigrants who live in the United States to self-deport.
“Don’t ever use my songs to promote your racist, hateful propaganda,” Rodrigo commented on the offending Instagram post.
In October, 1980s star Kenny Loggins slammed Trump’s use of his song Danger Zone, recorded for Top Gun, as a soundtrack for an AI-generated video that showed Trump flying over a “No Kings” protest and dropping faeces on demonstrators from a fighter jet emblazoned with the label “King Trump”.
“This is an unauthorised use of my performance of Danger Zone,” Loggins wrote at the time. “Nobody asked me for my permission, which I would have denied, and I request that my recording on this video is removed immediately.”
The video, with Loggins’ song, remains up on Trump’s Truth Social page.
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Bronte Gossling is a reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, WAtoday and Brisbane Times.Connect via email.
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