NME reports that country artist Jelly Roll has spoken out after causing a stir for meeting with Donald Trump recently, insisting he is “not political.” The Nashville rapper and singer-songwriter was seen shaking hands and smiling with the US president-elect at a UFC match at Madison Square Garden in New York last month.
During a new episode of Dumb Blonde – the podcast hosted by his wife, Bunnie XO – Jelly Roll explained: “Meeting President Trump was cool. Ultimately, I don’t really care [about] any blowback I get about it.”
He continued: “The truth is: it was really cool to meet the president.”
Bunnie XO – whose real name is Alyssa DeFord – added: “Anybody who gets the opportunity to meet a president, a vice president… anything like that. It’s a fucking honor.”
Jelly Roll – born Jason Bradley DeFord – agreed, explaining that it had nothing to do with his political affiliation. “I’m honored, man,” he said. “I was honored to every senator that took the time to come to talk to me about my testimony. I was honored. And I didn’t know which side any of them were on.
“[…] I’m trying to bring things together here, man. I’m gonna work with whatever administration is in play, for the rest of my life. Because my cause will always be what it is.”
DeFord went on to say that he also met Donald Trump Jr. at the event, describing him as a “sweet guy, as a human.” He said politics didn’t come into it “[when] you started meeting these people as humans.”
He told his wife: “Dude, there’s not a chance in hell that I’m not going to meet the president-elect. I don’t care. If I got a call to meet Joe Biden, I would have stopped at any point and [met] him. That’s the active president. I don’t care what he thinks or I think about policies.
“I don’t hide behind the ‘I’m not political’ stuff. I’m not political! People who actually know me know I’m also one of the old-school dudes. I like to talk about things I’m passionate about. With that, I like to know about it. I don’t know enough about politics to act like I know anything that’s going on or what anybody’s standing for policy-wise.”
DeFord then said that he “didn’t grow up in a voting culture,” adding: “My father didn’t push voting on me, my mother didn’t push voting on me. They did push ‘respect our president’ on me though.”
Alyssa DeFord told her husband that meeting a president was an “honor, no matter if you like them or not.”
As for what Trump said to him, DeFord revealed that the president-elect told him he loved his song “Save Me” and said that the artist was “doing incredible things.”
Jelly Roll released his tenth studio album Beautifully Broken in October, not long after which he claimed another artist’s team was allegedly trying to manipulate album charts. Next year, he will be opening for Post Malone on his North American stadium tour.
Trump secured a historic win in the 2024 US presidential election last month, trouncing Democratic candidate Kamala Harris. He will become the first ex-president to go back to the White House in more than 130 years.
Photo Credit: Boston Lynn Schulz
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