Olivia Rodrigo didn’t use a megaphone on stage during her Guts! tour for people to think she’s afraid of raising her voice. Last week, she slammed the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) using her song “All American B*tch” in an Instagram post. The DHS post utilized the duality of the song, first captioning the part of her musically screaming with clips of undocumented immigrants being forcefully arrested by ICE agents. The audio then transitions to Rodrigo softly singing “All the time, I’m grateful all the time,” with clips of immigrants supposedly self-deporting. The caption of the post read: “LEAVE NOW and self-deport using the CBP Home app. If you don’t, you will face the consequences.” 

Rodrigo left a comment regarding the use of her music, writing, “Don’t ever use my songs to promote your racist, hateful propaganda.” Though the post has now been deleted, this instance reflects a larger trend of DHS employing the use of other artists’ work, as well as painting immigration raids as something to be laughed at. Previously, they quoted Pokémon’s catchphrase “Gotta catch ’em all!” in reference to the immigrants in the United States , which was met with similar backlash from Nintendo and social media users. 

Rodrigo has been a loud critic of the Trump administration these past few months and has previously spoken out against the ICE raids occurring across the country. She wrote, “L.A. simply wouldn’t exist without immigrants. Treating hardworking community members with such little respect, empathy, and due process is awful.” Her utilizing her platform to call out the injustices of the current administration and encourage people to exercise their right to free speech and protest should not go unnoticed. With DHS’ use of copyrighted music or people’s likeness without permission from the owner, it is refreshing to see an artist not only stand up for their work but also call out the context in which it is being used.