Why pressure pop stars for political opinions?

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Red carpet, whole cloth …

I know more than a few dumb rednecks.

When you hail from one of the top 10 swamp cities in northeastern Florida, it’s just about impossible not to have a few bumpkins in your circle. At one point in my life, I held spare keys to the homes of multiple men who had lost fingers in fireworks accidents. I’ve spent many nights playing video games with people who’ve purchased more pet snakes than they’ve cast ballots. I’m friendly with zero country superstars, but I’m acquainted with a Jelly Roll or two.

The chart-topper who bears that name inspired outrage at the Grammys on Sunday. Jelly Roll was questioned about his stance on ongoing ICE operations on the red carpet. He announced that he was not the man to ask about politics.

Describing himself as “a dumb redneck,” Jelly Roll singer admitted he hasn’t “watched enough” to form a coherent opinion.

“People shouldn’t care to hear my opinion,” he said. “I didn’t have a phone for 18 months…I hate to be the artist that’s that aloof, but I’m so disconnected from what’s happening.”

To those of us who do possess phones and, at least intermittently, pay attention to the news, Jelly Roll’s response may seem impossible. On a night when many of his fellow musicians made direct statements about ICE and Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant crackdown, the “aw, shucks” balking sounds cynical. Jelly Roll’s pop-country fanbase undoubtedly includes many MAGA die-hards and quite a few outraged moderates. Closing the chat with a promo for a “loud and clear” statement coming in the next week certainly didn’t help.

The distant cousins I see mirrored in the “Son of a Sinner” singer might be clouding my judgement, but I choose to believe Jelly Roll when he says he “didn’t know politics were f**king real until I was in my mid-20s, in jail.”

I’ve spent my entire life in red states. I’ve shot targets, run hunting dogs and gigged frogs in the company of expert family members. If you pressed me about the technical aspects of any of those activities, or asked me to take a stand on their merits, it would be immediately clear that I’m an occasional interloper in that world. And Jelly Roll didn't need to look too far down the carpet to see the dangers of speaking out on subjects he knew little about.

Superproducer Jack Antonoff caused a stir that same night when he wore an anti-ICE pin on his jacket and couldn’t offer a satisfying reason for his stance.

“It’s terrible, you know,” he told Variety. ““I mean, it’s time to … it’s just … for every reason you could imagine, I would think.”

That response earned jeers on social media. One X user jokingly wondered if Antonoff had borrowed the jacket. Another decried the Taylor Swift collaborator’s “performative ‘activism,’” calling it “incredibly disappointing.”

This is a truth that’s been lost in the politically polarized and overheated Trump era, but the average American is not exactly a political newshound. A record number of Americans pledge allegiance to neither of the two major political parties. Turnout has ticked upward from its nadir in the ‘90s, but around one in every three Americans never vote in presidential elections. Presumably, that includes a couple of pop stars.

The “shut up and sing” cohort is wrong, of course, but imagine yourself on the other side of the microphone. “Sing and shut up” can look awfully appealing after you’ve seen what can happen when one of your fellow musicians gets it wrong.

 What do you think? Was Jelly Roll being sincere or overly cynical? Should we care about pop stars’ politics? Click the speech bubble icon to sound off in the comments.

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