Swedish pop star Zara Larsson has condemned the White House for using one of her most recognisable songs in a social media reel.
The clip used Larsson’s Midnight Sun in a video appearing to show immigration enforcement raids. The song has since been removed from the post, but the video is still visible on the White House’s TikTok feed.
The video is captioned “never ending deportations”, riffing on Larsson’s lyrics “never-ending midnight sun”.
In a three-minute reaction video posted on social media, Larsson described the clip as “dehumanising”, joining a growing list of singers, including Sabrina Carpenter and Ariana Grande, who have told the Trump administration to not use their music.
The BBC has contacted the White House for comment.
The reel splices together multiple videos of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, as well as other US law enforcement personnel, handcuffing men and putting them into vehicles.
Larsson reposted part of the original clip, which then cuts to a selfie video of her using her fingers to hold an ‘L’ shape against her forehead.
In the reaction video that has already clocked up more than 4.2 million views on TikTok, she tells her followers the White House video is “so dehumanising”.
Larsson continues: “These people in this video – they’re real people.”
“The vast majority of these people who are undocumented are regular people with jobs and they’re just trying to have a better future”.
“It’s so crazy how everything is so memefied and so ‘ha-ha-ha’,” she says, accusing the White House of using her song to sow “division”, despite the lyrics reflecting a connection between people and nature, according to Larsson.
Earlier this year, Larsson condemned a video of President Donald Trump dancing at various events overlayed with her hit Lush Life.
White House social media accounts have been forced to remove various songs from their feed following interventions from artists.
Taylor Swift’s seasonal track August disappeared from a reel shared by the Trump administration in August, while one of Olivia Rodrigo’s songs vanished from a video after the singer condemned its use for what she called “hateful propaganda”.
Sabrina Carpenter and Ariana Grande have also warned the Trump administration in separate incidents to not use their music in social media content after the White House posted videos featuring their songs.
