Taylor Swift Concert at Nats Park or Political Fundraiser?
When senators finished voting for the evening Monday, at least a couple of them were heading to Nationals Park — not for an evening of baseball, but rather to use a pop sensation to raise campaign money. Music star Taylor Swift is in town for a pair of concerts over the All-Star break.
Republican Sens. John Thune of South Dakota and Jerry Moran of Kansas are among the lawmakers cashing in.
“There’s a lot of interest. If you want to have an event, a fundraising event where people actually want to come to it, do it around a Taylor Swift concert,” said Thune, the Republican Conference chairman. “My guess is the audience is going to be considerably younger than it would be like at an Eagles concert or a U2 concert, but it should be fun.”
The Eagles formed in 1971, about 18 years before Swift was even born.
No fewer than 26 fundraisers are planned at the ballpark over the two days of Swift performances, where regular tickets were running upwards of $200 for the cheap seats on the ticket exchange website StubHub. The fundraisers for Moran, Thune and a host of other lawmakers and political action committees will set donors back considerably more.
That said, the senators think they’ll appeal to a bit of a different demographic.
“That is significantly different than my normal life,” Moran said. “But it is very popular with … fathers and their children.”
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