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Katy Perry is again getting political, and not just in her choice of boyfriend.
The 41-year-old pop star, who has been dating former prime minister Justin Trudeau since last July, criticized the Trump Administration over the weekend for using one of her songs in a TikTok video about the war with Iran.
The nine-second video, posted Thursday on the White House account, used part of her song Firework as the soundtrack to a series of explosions — grainy footage of what appear to be recent U.S. strikes against Iran.
The explosions are in sync with the lyrics “Boom, boom, boom.”
The accompanying message on the video: “Iran has been warned.”
Perry said Saturday she was “deeply appalled and angry to see” her music used this way.
“I wrote this song to be an anthem of hope, healing, and inner strength for people going through their darkest personal moments,” she wrote on X.
“To see a message of self-worth and upliftment weaponized to soundtrack destruction and violence is a complete violation of everything my song stands for.”
The White House has not responded.
Perry may not condone it, but legally, she has very little control over how that song and others are used, having sold the publishing rights for five of her albums to Litmus Music for a reported $225 million US in 2023. That deal included the Teenage Dream album which includes Firework.
Universal Music Group continues to own the masters — meaning it controls how the audio is used, shared and monetized — and Universal’s music has been fully available on TikTok as part of a multi-year global licensing agreement, first struck in 2024.
Other artists object
Perry is not the only artist who has criticized the Trump administration for using their work in unauthorized ways.
In June, pop star Ariana Grande complained about the White House using her music in a video about its immigration policies. “Please do not ever use my music in relation to this barbaric, inhumane, heinous nonsense,” she wrote on TikTok.
Bruce Springsteen has also objected to U.S. President Donald Trump using his songs, going back to political rallies in 2016.
On Friday night, the New Jersey rocker found himself on the receiving end of one of Trump’s jokes at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner — accused of spending more of his show focused on politics than performing.
Perry has previously supported U.S. Democrats including Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in their runs for the White House against Trump.
It’s also no secret Trump is not a fan Trudeau, having told reporters after his first face-to-face meeting with Mark Carney that he was happy to see the previous prime minister gone.
Perry accompanied Trudeau earlier this year to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where he delivered about the virtues of soft power.
