Donald Trump just can’t help himself from voicing his grievances. And that’s what happened when he gave a shout out to country music singer Billy Ray Cyrus at Saturday’s Bitcoin 2024 convention in Nashville.
“Billy Ray Cyrus is here. Where is Billy Ray?” Trump was caught saying in a video from the event. “He’s around here someplace, and he’s great. He’s a conservative guy.”
But Trump couldn’t stop there. He then made this snarky comment heckling the country singer’s daughter, pop star Miley Cyrus.
“I said, ‘How did you get such a liberal daughter?’” Trump added. “‘How did that happen, Billy Ray?’”
Now Trump has used much worse language to insult people. But his timing couldn’t have been worse. That’s because Cyrus’ estranged wife Firerose released an audio tape earlier this month in which Cyrus appeared to be referring to Miley as a “devil” and a “skank.”
Miley Cyrus has been estranged from her father since he divorced her mother, Tish, in 2022. And when she won Record of the Year for her hit song “Flowers” at February’s Grammy awards ceremony she excluded any mention of her dad in her acceptance speech.
And then social media users pointed out that Trump just happened to be going after the beloved goddaughter of country legend Dolly Parton. Dolly also happens to be childless.
While Dolly doesn’t own any pets herself, she is an animal lover and released her own line of “Doggy Parton” pet apparel with some of the proceeds going to Willa B Farms Animal Rescue in Old Hickory, Tenn. It’s a grassroots non-profit “dedicated to improving the lives of homeless, neglected, abused and abandoned animals.”
And Dolly fans were quick to post pictures of Dolly displaying her love for cats.
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And so Trump managed to inadvertently add Dolly Parton’s name to the list of those supposedly “miserable” women whom his weird VP pick JD Vance believes are ruining the country. Vance has already alienated Taylor Swift and Jennifer Aniston fans.
Of course, some social media users were quick to point out how Dolly Parton reflects the best of Appalachia as opposed to Shillbilly Vance.
And this post linked to a video about Dolly talking about why she did have any children.
Here’s the video.
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Parton loves children, but she couldn’t have any of her own because of health reasons. She took care of her younger siblings, and Aunt Dolly enjoyed baby sitting at her home for her nieces, nephews and other children.
She founded the non-profit Imagination Library, a literacy project founded with her father, who could not read or write, which has mailed out nearly 245 million free books to 3.1 million children up to age 5 in the U.S. and four other English-speaking countries.
Dolly said in an interview on “Today”: “Well God has a plan for everything, but I said that I think it probably was his plan for me not to have kids, so everybody’s kids could be mine and they are now.”
But don’t expect Parton to go out and criticize Trump or endorse Harris. She has always stayed out of direct political involvement and has avoided endorsing candidates throughout her career.
But she has not exactly endeared herself to MAGA cultists. She donated $1 million to the Vanderbilt University Medical Center to help develop the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine and posted a video showing herself getting vaccinated and urging her fans to do the same.
Dolly is also considered an icon in the LGBTQ+ community. She was an early supporter of marriage equality and opposed bathroom bans. And this is what she said in a Nov. 2023 interview with The Hollywood Reporter when asked about a bill passed in Tennessee that allows discrimination against transgender people.
Well, what I always say, “I just want everybody to be treated good.” I try not to get into the politics of everything. I try to get into the human element of it. I have some of everybody in my own immediate family and in my circle of employees. I’ve got transgender people. I’ve got gays. I’ve got lesbians. I’ve got drunks. I’ve got drug addicts — all within my own family. I know and love them all, and I do not judge.
And I just see how broken-hearted they get over certain things and I know how real they are. I know how important this is to them. That’s who they are. They cannot help that any more than I can help being Dolly Parton, you know, the way people know me. If there’s something to be judged, that is God’s business. But we are all God’s children and how we are is who we are.
And so as a Christian, Parton believes that love trumps hate. But that didn’t stop the right-wing website The Federalist from publishing an opinion piece last month headlined “There’s Nothing Loving About Dolly Parton’s False Gospel.”
It read:
When asked about her diverse community of fans, Parton always mentions Christianity, saying she does her best “not to judge” and only “to love” for that reason.
But Parton’s version of love, which includes condoning immoral sexual behavior (“be who you are,” she’s said), is unaligned with God’s vision for humanity. Like so many secularized spiritual leaders, Parton equates love with agreement, but the two are not reciprocal. Love doesn’t mean we must accept sinfulness as good to avoid hurting someone’s feelings.
And Dolly fans didn’t hold back when it came to criticizing The Federalist story.
It got so bad that the author of The Federalist article Ericka Andersen expressed regrets for using Dolly as an example in her article..
And in case you’re wondering about where Miley Cyrus stands? Well for starters, she most definitely is a childless cat lady and has a whole menagerie of pets.
And Cyrus has been quite outspoken about her hatred of Trump. Back in March 2016 she described Trumphas “a nightmare” who acts like he’s “the chosen one.” That’s the same year that JD Vance referred to Trump as “America’s Hitler.”
It’s pretty certain that Cyrus will endorse Kamala. After all in October 2020, she told Kamala directly that she intended to vote for the Biden/Harris ticket in an Instagram post.
And finally, let’s dedicate this performance by Dolly and Miley of Cyrus’ 2013 single “Wrecking Ball,” her first number one song on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, to JD Vance’ who “came in like a wrecking ball” to Trump’s campaign. It’s from “Miley’s New Year’s Party” on Dec. 31, 2022.