Rap star Eminem has formally asked Republican presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy to stop using his music on the campaign trail, according to a letter made public on Monday.
A video of Ramaswamy, who is enjoying a surge in the Republican primary race, singing along to Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” at the Iowa State Fair went viral earlier this month.
In a letter first reported by the Daily Mail, the authenticity of which was confirmed to AFP, music licenser Broadcast Music Inc. (BMI) stated that it had received an official request from Eminem demanding that the 38-year-old candidate no longer use his music.
Ramaswamy, who likens himself as “Trump 2.0,” has risen surprisingly to third place among Republicans who are in the running for the 2024 presidential primary elections.
As an undergraduate at Harvard, his side hustle was rapping libertarian-minded lyrics with the stage name “Da Vek.”
“If you think debater-extraordinaire Vivek G. Ramaswamy ’07 is intense, you obviously haven’t met Da Vek,” The Crimson, Harvard’s student newspaper, humorously noted in 2006.
During the last two elections, well-known artists including Pharrell Williams, Rihanna, Aerosmith and Adele — as well as heirs of Prince — complained that their songs were played at Donald Trump rallies without their permission.
The Rolling Stones even threatened to sue if the Trump campaign continued to use the British group’s classic hit “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.”