Trump Has to Stop Playing His Favorite Song at Rallies, Judge Rules

Donald Trump can’t use Isaac Hayes’s song “Hold On, I’m Coming” at his rallies anymore thanks to a federal judge in Georgia.

On Tuesday, Thomas Thrash Jr. of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, responding to a lawsuit from Hayes’s estate, issued a temporary injunction against Trump using the song “without proper license.” Trump’s campaign has been using the song to close out his speeches this year, including at the Republican National Convention.

As recently as August 9, Trump used “Hold On, I’m Coming” at a rally in Montana, but since then, he’s been using the Village People’s “YMCA,” which he also used in his 2020 presidential campaign. (Not surprisingly, they aren’t happy with Trump using their music either.)

Hayes’s estate hopes to make the measure permanent.

“We are very pleased with the court’s decision,” James L. Walker Jr., a lawyer for the Hayes estate, told The New York Times. “Donald Trump has been told he cannot use the music of Isaac Hayes without a license. That was our No. 1 goal. Now we work on the underlying trial and case.”

Trump’s campaign did get one reprieve from the judge: Recordings from previous campaign events where they used Hayes’s song can stay online. But that hardly softens the blow when there’s a long list of artists who don’t want Trump using their music. Just last week, Swedish pop group ABBA objected to Trump using their songs at a Minnesota rally.

Before that, Beyoncé, Celine Dion, Sinéad O’Connor, The Beatles, Adele, Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, Foo Fighters, Guns N’ Roses, Leonard Cohen, Queen, Prince, Pharrell, the Rolling Stones, The Smiths’ Johnny Marr, Rihanna, Neil Young, Linkin Park, the late Tom Petty, the Village People, and Aerosmith front man Steven Tyler all banned Trump from playing their music for his campaign.

Perhaps Trump ought to stick with artists who actually support him and would want their music played at his campaign events. But then he’d be stuck with Kid Rock, Kanye West, and country music.