Top line
Taylor Swift won Video of the Year, the most prestigious award for the music video for her song “Fortnight,” at the MTV Video Music Awards on Wednesday night, and also took home Artist of the Year honors in a record-breaking night.
Taylor Swift accepts the award for Video of the Year for “Fortnight” on stage at MTV Video Music 2024 … (+)
Key data
In addition to the two main awards, Swift also won the Best Pop award, which is given to the best pop artist, the award for best collaboration between her team and Post Malone on “Fortnight” and the award for best director for directing the music video for “Fortnight.”
In her speech after winning the grand prize, Swift thanked “my friend Travis Kelce,” adding, “Everything that man touches turns into happiness, fun and magic, so I want to thank him for bringing that to our shoot.”
The pop star also thanked Post Malone, saying, “There’s a reason why (he) … is the person everyone loves to work with the most in the music industry,” and then joked, “It took me forever to stop him from calling me ma’am.”
At the beginning of her speech, Swift said, “As I woke up this morning in New York, I reflected on what happened 23 years ago.” She then took a moment to “remember all those who lost a loved one on 9/11 and all those we have lost.”
Swift said she appreciated the fact that “this is a fan-voted award” and thanked her fans before reminding them, “If you’re over 18, please register to vote for something else that matters – the presidential election.”
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Important background
Swift’s call for her fans to register to vote comes just a day after the musician endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president shortly after the first presidential debate. In a post on her Instagram account, Swift praised Harris as someone who “fights for the rights and causes I believe in.”
”, adding that she believes “we can accomplish so much more in this country when we are guided by calm, not chaos.” The pop star’s post also addressed former President Donald Trump’s sharing of AI-generated images to imply that Swift would have supported him, saying, “This really reignited my fears about AI and the dangers of spreading misinformation. It made me realize that as a voter, I need to be very transparent about my actual plans for this election.” Swift’s post also appeared to be a jab at comments made by Trump’s running mate, Senator JD Vance, about Democratic women, captioning the post “Childless cat lady” and using a photo of her with her cat.
Surprising fact
With five awards on Wednesday night, Swift overtook Beyoncé as the artist with the most wins at the VMAs. Swift now has 30 wins at the MTV-hosted awards, compared to Beyoncé’s 27, 25 of which came as a solo artist. Swift also won her award for fight video of the year on Wednesday, extending her own record. Beyoncé, Eminem, Kendrick Lamar, Missy Elliott and Rihanna are the only other artists to have won the VMAs’ top prize multiple times, with each of them winning it twice.
More information
Taylor Swift supports Kamala Harris after debate with Trump (Forbes)
Taylor Swift endorses Kamala Harris: Billionaire pop star’s political past explained (Forbes)
Taylor Swift could win big at the VMAs one day after Harris’ endorsement – but will she attend? (Forbes)
