With Americans set to vote in the mid-term elections next week, and likely to give the Democrats a majority in at least the House Of Representatives, it seems like a good time for another pop star to sue Donald Trump for using their music at his political rallies. 

And who better to instigate this latest lawsuit than Neil Young, who is suing Trump – or technically a political financing committee that backs Trump and his political allies – over the President’s use of his song ‘Rockin In The Free World’ at a pre-election event earlier this month. 

If Young suing Trump over his use of ‘Rockin In The Free World’ sounds familiar, that’s because we’ve been here before. Young went legal over Trump’s use of ‘Rockin In The Free World’ back in 2020, and yet the President has started playing it at his rallies all over again. 

That’s despite the fact that, if you bother to listen to the lyrics of ‘Rockin In The Free World’, you’ll quickly notice the song is – in the words of Young’s lawyers in his new lawsuit – “the opposite of everything that Donald J Trump stands for”. 

Because, they add, it’s “a blistering anthem that contrasts the hollow promises of American political rhetoric with the harsh realities faced by the poor, homeless and forgotten”. 

Trump settled the 2020 litigation, and that legal settlement is given as a reason for why Trump and his team knew they didn’t have permission to play ‘Rockin In The Free World’ at a recent rally in Youngstown, Ohio, meaning they willfully infringed the copyright in the song. 

With the 2020 litigation, the new lawsuit states, the Donald J Trump For President organisation, which was organising Trump’s rallies at the time, “asserted no defence and immediately settled”, while also “promising that it would never again use ‘Rockin In The Free World’ without permission from Young”.

And yet, the lawsuit continues, the current Trump campaign group, the Trump 47 Committee, “has wilfully proceeded to cause the song to be played despite its lack of a licence and despite its knowledge that a licence is required to do so”. 

Although they specifically cite Trump’s use of ‘Rockin In The Free World’ at a rally in the aptly named Youngstown, Young’s team believe that the Trump 47 Committee has “caused the song to be played numerous times at other rallies designed to encourage Republican votes in the upcoming mid-term elections”. 

Expanding on the fact Trump’s decision to play Young’s song is ironic as well as illegal, given it is “the opposite of everything that President stands for”, the new lawsuit explains more about the song’s themes.

The lyrics, it says, “paint vivid street-level portraits”, including “a mother discarding her baby, addicts lost in despair, garbage piling in the shadows of prosperity”, while “the repeated chorus delivers a savage irony, celebrating freedom that clearly isn’t shared by all”. 

Of course Trump and his team rarely consider the lyrics or history of the songs they use as part of their political campaigning, and this isn’t the only song choice that seemed somewhat inappropriate. 

When they included Eddy Grant’s ‘Electric Avenue’ in a 2020 campaign video without permission, Grant’s lawyer noted that Trump’s use of the track – which is basically a protest song about racial inequality in 1980s Britain – “indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of the very meaning of the underlying work”.

Then there’s Trump’s constant use of ‘YMCA’, despite it being widely seen as gay anthem while the Trump base is famously hostile towards LGBTQ rights. 

Though, you may remember, Village People’s Victor Willis – who initially complained about Trump’s use of his song but later said he was fine with it – is also adamant that ‘YMCA’ is not, in fact, a gay anthem. So maybe there’s no irony at all in Trump and his base liking it so much. 

Willis is among a minority of artists who are happy with Trump playing their songs at his political rallies. Though there has been some debate over what artists can do, legally speaking, to stop their songs sound-tracking the President’s political campaigning. 

If it’s a campaign video – like the one that used Grant’s ‘Electric Avenue’ – it’s a bit more straightforward. Trump or his campaign organisation need to secure a sync licence and, if they fail to do so, that’s copyright infringement. A judge confirmed that fact after Grant sued. 

But when songs are played in public spaces, that usage is usually covered by the blanket licences issued by the music industry’s collecting societies like BMI and ASCAP. Those licences generally allow licensees to use any songs written by songwriters who are members of the society that issues the licence. 

However, there is an exception with political events in the US. Politicians need to secure their own political campaign licences from BMI and ASCAP – they can’t rely on any licences held by a venue – and, with the political licences, BMI and ASCAP allow writers to opt-out. If they do, the writer’s songs are not covered by the licence when it is issued to any one politician or political campaign group. 

There is some debate within legal circles over whether or not BMI and ASCAP are actually allowed to provide that flexibility for their members under the consent decrees that regulate how they license music. To date, we’ve never had a lawsuit over music usage at a Trump rally actually get to court to get some judicial clarity on whether BMI and ASCAP can allow members to opt-out of specific political licences. 

Back when Young sued Trump in 2020, ASCAP confirmed that ‘Rockin In The Free World’ is covered by its licence and that Young had opted the song out of its political licences. So if this case gets to court, the legal status of those opt-outs could be in the spotlight. Though the Trump 47 Committee will likely settle – and presumably promise to never play Young’s song at another Trump event ever again. Again. 

Maybe the President could just get his new best bud Nicki Minaj to soundtrack all his future events, following her speech at one of his rallies this weekend. 

She’s the “queen of rap” after all, or at least according to Trump, who also noted that Minaj has “never looked more beautiful” and has “one hell of a beautiful ass”. Presumably Minaj won’t be withdrawing any of her songs from any political event licences any time soon. Or at least not Trump’s licences. 

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