Kacey Musgraves already has eight Grammys, but if there were awards given out for trolling MAGA and its acolytes, she’d clean up there too.
The Texas-born singer’s Middle of Nowhere tour kickoff in Chicago last week was the perfect case study in how artfully she’s able to thrill, piss off, and offend the far right in one fell swoop. First, she delights them (warming up the crowd with the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders’ theme song “Thunderstruck,” covering George Strait, wearing a giant belt buckle and an even larger Stetson). Then, she hath taketh away: descending from the heavens to play “Rhinestoned” on a giant pair of disco balls (or, to be more precise, disco truck nutz) and asking for fans to donate to the local organization Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights in honor of her birthday. (She turned 38 on Friday.)
“It’s a wonderful organization, and they help give aid, legal aid, and money to children whose parents have been deported unfairly,” Musgraves said from the stage. “It’s not a political thing. It’s just, these kids need help.”
Predictably, Fox News’ Tomi Lahren wasn’t having it, posting on X “what is an unfair deportation?” Newsmax’s Rob Schmitt was oh so elegant in his response, remarking that “nowhere is safe from libtards. Not even country music.” MAGA influencer Vince Langman bemoaned “what happened to the country music industry?” For context, the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights advocates for children who are separated for their parents or placed alone in government custody: not exactly something that should, on the surface, be glaringly offensive. Country music is a genre of family values, and what’s more supportive of the family than making sure children are cared for, regardless of who their parents are?
Musgraves, for her part, has previously supported the Young Center and, back in May, asked a trio of brothers — mariachi musicians — who had been detained by ICE in Texas for two weeks to open for her intimate concerts at Gruene Hall in New Braunfels. Aside from giving the spotlight to a family that had just been put through a terrifying experience, Musgraves has been forcefully and repeatedly connecting the dots between how closely related — and indebted — country music is to Mexican traditional sounds and the people that MAGA is constantly demonizing and targeting.
Musgraves knows well that poking the MAGA bear only ends up in raising more money for the causes she believes in, even if it means a few days of relentless bashing on Fox News. In 2021, she raised money for unhoused immigrants and Texans affected by a historic winter storm by ragging on Senator Ted Cruz, who hopped a plane to, yes, Mexico while his own constituents were suffering. Her “Cruzin for a bruzin’” shirt raised thousands for select charities.
The songwriter, who just released a line of branded lube, has been one of Fox News’ most beloved targets for years. After she urged for gun control during Lollapalooza in 2019 (yelling “somebody fucking do something” from the stage), Fox anchor Ainsley Earhardt called her “the modern day Dixie Chick.” But 2019 was the year that Musgraves won the Grammy for Album of the Year for Golden Hour, so if “modern day Dixie Chick” was meant to mean “wins awards while making MAGA miserable” then, well, yeah, point taken.
