Did Country Music Television ban Taylor Swift "for life" from their channel? No, that's not true: There is no publicly available and credible evidence that the company made that decision. An early version of the claim appeared on a website that publishes fictitious satirical content.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) published on Facebook on February 26, 2024. The caption of the post read:
CMT bans Taylor Swift for life, declaring a bold stance against 'woke music'
This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:
(Source: Facebook screenshot taken on Mon Mar 4 16:43:18 2024 UTC)
In a comment, the user who made the post linked to an article titled "Breaking: CMT Issues Lifetime Ban on Taylor Swift, 'She's Worse Than Garth Brooks'" (archived here), which was published on February 14, 2024, on the website Esspots. The article does not provide any source for the claim.
Additionally, the article is labeled as "SATIRE," which is further indicated on the website's "About Us" page (archived here). The page opens:
Welcome to the US page of Esspots (A Subsidiary of SpaceXMania.com specializing in Satire and Parody News), your one-stop destination for satirical news and commentary about the United States of America. Our team of writers and editors is dedicated to bringing you the latest and greatest in fake news and absurdity, all with a healthy dose of humor and satire.
On this page, you can expect to find all sorts of hilarious stories and parodies about US politics, culture, and society. From outrageous conspiracy theories to outlandish political stunts, we've got it all covered.
Lead Stories searched for "Taylor Swift" on the CMT website and did not find any results corroborating the claim (archived here).
Other Lead Stories fact checks related to Taylor Swift can be found here.
