WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden will welcome the Kansas City Chiefs to the White House on Friday to celebrate the NFL team’s third Super Bowl victory in five years.
The entire team was scheduled to participate in the event on Gramado Sul, for the second time in two years. But one person whose presence was not anticipated was singer Taylor Swift, girlfriend of tight end Travis Kelce.
Biden will honor the Chiefs for their overtime victory over the San Francisco 49ers in the Super Bowl in Las Vegas in February. It is a long-standing tradition for championship sports teams, both professional and collegiate, to be invited to the White House.
The Chiefs have won the Super Bowl three times in the last five years. In 2023, they defeated the Philadelphia Eagles, First Lady Jill Biden’s favorite football team. She grew up near Philadelphia and watched the game.
Kansas City also defeated San Francisco to claim the 2020 Super Bowl title.
The Chiefs shared on social media Friday that “we are celebrating our back-to-back championship seasons and victory in Super Bowl LVIII at the White House.”
Kicker Harrison Butker, who made headlines when attacking some of Biden’s policies during a commencement speech earlier this month, was expected to accompany his teammates to the White House. Butker recently defended his comments, saying he had no regrets about expressing his beliefs.
In her May 16 speech at Benedictine College, a private Catholic liberal arts school in Atchison, Kansas, Butker congratulated the women who were graduating and said most of them were probably more excited about getting married and having children. He criticized some of Biden’s policy positions, including the Democratic president’s condemnation of the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade. Wade in 1973, which legalized abortion nationwide, and his defense of freedom of choice. Abortion is an issue that Biden and his fellow Democrats hope to use to their advantage in the November elections.
Butker also addressed Biden’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has killed nearly 1.2 million people in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
As for Swift, her absence would certainly disappoint many in the White House.
Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre dodged questions earlier this week about whether the 34-year-old singer-songwriter would appear.
“That’s a good question,” said Jean-Pierre. “I can’t talk about her schedule. But I know there’s a lot of interest in this building, on this campus.”
Swift was traveling abroad on her Eras tour, with a show scheduled for Thursday in Madrid.
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