Editor’s note: This story was published before news broke that there were shots fired at the Kansas City Chiefs parade. Get updates on the ongoing situation here.
As Kansas City prepared to fete the Chiefs with their Super Bowl championship parade, city officials hinted that they asked one of the most famous people on Earth not to attend.
City manager Brian Platt told local public radio station KCUR that the city may have reached out to Taylor Swift’s team to kindly ask the singer (and girlfriend of Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce) not to add to the chaos.
“I can’t confirm or deny, but we might have already told that to her team, just to keep everybody safe and make things a little bit easier for us,” Platt said.
To be fair, it also might be a little easier for Swift. The music superstar is scheduled to perform in Australia on Friday, February 16, which presents logistical concerns similar to what Swift, 34, had to endure to get from her concert in Tokyo to Las Vegas for the Super Bowl on Sunday, February 11.
Then again, she made that happen. Kansas City mayor Quinton Lucas later clarified that she is, actually, welcome to join the celebration on for Wednesday, February 14.
“Just had a great chat with @kcpolice Chief Graves,” Lucas wrote via X on Tuesday, February 13. “We’re enchanted to welcome everyone to tomorrow’s parade and the women and men of our police department are prepared to keep all safe.”
As it turns out, Swift did not take Lucas up on the offer. TMZ reported on Wednesday that Swift has already touched down in Australia, with throngs of fans meeting her private jet at around midnight local time. Kelce and his teammates, meanwhile, are busy living it up in the streets of Kansas City.
Now, the attention shifts to whether Kelce, also 34, will join Swift for any of her shows in Australia — a country he admitted to wanting to visit last week. Swift’s first show of this leg of the tour is at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Friday, with 85,000 Swifties expected to attend.
Her absence stateside didn’t stop Chiefs fans from adding a T-Swift flavor to their revelry on Wednesday. Swift’s 2015 hit song “Bad Blood” blared on speakers lining the city streets as red-clad fans celebrated and awaited their championship team’s arrival.
Swift’s whereabouts have been a consistent story line throughout the football season as she sprinkled in stops to multiple Chiefs games around the country amid her record-shattering Eras Tour. Even with no more games to play, don’t expect that to end any time soon. Her post–Super Bowl celebrations with Kelce, his family and teammates have been well-documented, and the NFL itself has embraced Swift as one of its own on social media.
Long live Swift’s football era.
