Background

John Roger Stephens, more commonly known as “John Legend,” was born on December 28, 1978 in Springfield, Ohio. Raised by a working-class family, the boy developed a talent for playing the piano at a young age. After graduating high school at 16, he attended the University of Pennsylvania where he performed in student musical groups and ultimately earned a B.A. in English in 1999.

Legend worked as a consultant for the prestigious Boston Consulting Group during the early part of his professional career. His desire to be a musician, however, eventually led him to pursue new opportunities in the music industry, starting in New York and Philadelphia. Legend received his first big break through a roommate’s cousin who put him in touch with rapper Kanye West. Since signing his first major record contract in 2004, Legend has become one of the most successful R&B artists in the world. He has won 10 Grammy awards, as well as an Emmy, an Oscar, and a Tony award for his efforts in film, television, and theater, respectively.

Marriage to Chrissy Tiegen

Legend married model Chrissy Teigen on September 14, 2013.

Supporter of the Democratic Party

In addition to his work as an entertainer, Legend has become a high-profile political activist for Democrat Party causes.

Legend reportedly contributed $25,000 to Democrats during the 2012 election cycle.

On Election Day in November 2012, Legend urged voters in the crucial swing state of Ohio to “re-elect Sherrod Brown back to the Senate.”

On December 3, 2020, Legend performed at the “Rock The Runoff Virtual Concert” – organized by Stacey Abrams — on behalf of Georgia Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, whose upcoming Senate runoff elections on January 5, 2021 would determine which party would control the U.S. Senate.

In September 2021, Legend opposed the recall effort to remove California Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom from office, due to widespread voter dissatisfaction with the governor’s handling of a variety of issues, such as homelessness, COVID-19 restrictions, and the state’s high cost of living.

In October 2022, then-Senate candidate John Fetterman stated that he was “grateful” to have Legend on his “team.”

Supporter & Friend of Barack & Michelle Obama

A staunch supporter of Barack Obama, Legend performed at the 2008 Democratic National Convention, playing a song called “Yes We Can” in Obama’s honor.

According to National Public Radio, Legend spent the months after Obama’s 2008 electoral victory collaborating with a band called The Roots to produce “covers of politically motivated soul music from the 1960s and ’70s.” Intended to inspire optimism with the arrival of the newly installed Obama administration, the Wake Up! album featured songs like “Hard Times,” “Our Generation (The Hope of the World),” “Little Ghetto Boy,” “Hang on in There,” “Humanity (Love the Way It Should Be),” “Wholy Holy,” and “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free.”

Legend made a surprise visit to the Obama White House in 2009.

In February 2011, Legend performed during a Motown-themed concert at the Obama White House.

In March 2012, Legend attended a state dinner for British Prime Minister David Cameron at the Obama White House.

In 2012, Legend was considered a part of the Obama re-election campaign’s strategy to target young voters in battleground states with free concerts given by famous performers. On Election Day that November, Legend performed to voters in the crucial swing state of Ohio in order to promote not only Obama, but also the reelection bid of Democrat Senator Sherrod Brown. “Our mission is to make sure we re-elect President Obama, we re-elect Sherrod Brown back to the Senate, we gotta have folks all throughout Washington who are looking out for our interests,” Legend said.

In January 2014, Legend sang “Happy Birthday” at the White House for First Lady Michelle Obama’s 50th birthday party. Other notable celebrity attendees included Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Paul McCartney, Beyonce, Donna Brazile, and Samuel L. Jackson.

In March 2016, The Late Show host Stephen Colbert asked Chrissy Teigen, who at the time was pregnant with Legend’s child, whether the couple had already selected a name for their child, who was due to be born the following month. In the course of her answer, Tiegen said: “I asked Barack… we’re like very first-name basis. I asked President Obama if he liked one our name choice [which she did not reveal to the audience] and he said he did. But then I realized I should have came up with two so he could pick one, because you know, you gotta be nice about it if you give someone a name…”          “I wanted to ask him because John isn’t sold on the name, so I figured if [the president] liked it, then John would be sold on it. But he says it’s ‘too Hollywood.’”

In August 2016 Legend produced an original song called “Start,” for Southside With You, a biographical film about Barack and Michelle Obama.

After regularly advocating for the wearing of face masks to combat COVID-19, Legend went to Martha’s Vineyard to attend Barack Obama’s 60th birthday party along with hundreds of other maskless guests in August 2021.

Commencement Address at Kean University

In May 2011, Legend received $25,000 for a 15-minute commencement address which he delivered to the new graduates of Kean University in New Jersey. “Find ways to give. Find ways to serve. Find ways to contribute to society,” he told the students.

Supporter of Soft Consequences for Marijuana Law Violations

In December 2012, Legend applauded the Obama administration’s lax enforcement of marijuana laws. He also served as an executive producer with Brad Pitt on a documentary called The House I Live In, which negatively portrayed the federal government’s War on Drugs. Legend and Pitt were assisted in the project by co-producers producers Danny Glover and Russell Simmons.

Curator for the Soundtrack of 12 Years a Slave

In October 2013, Columbia Records announced that Legend would curate the soundtrack for the film 12 Years a Slave, the story of a free black man from upstate New York who is abducted and sold into slavery in Louisiana in 1841.

In January 2014, Legend sang “Happy Birthday” at the White House for First Lady Michelle Obama’s 50th birthday party. Other notable celebrity attendees included Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Paul McCartney, Beyonce, Donna Brazile, and Samuel L. Jackson.

Portraying America as a Racist Nation

After the 2014 deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown — frequently invoked by left-wing activists as black victims of American “racism” and “police brutality” — Legend wrote that “we are far from [Martin Luther] King’s dream of equality and justice for all,” adding:

“Slavery ended 150 years ago. The most egregious elements of Jim Crow were deemed illegal 50 years ago. But the problems of structural racism are old and ongoing. We still have a huge wealth gap rooted in decades of job, wage and housing discrimination. Voting restrictions that disproportionately affect the poor, minorities and youth are in place and growing. A persistent gap between black and white student achievement points to an education system that fails to provide a ladder of opportunity for everyone. African-American communities are being crushed by a criminal justice system that over-polices us, over-arrests us, over-incarcerates us and disproportionately takes the lives of our unarmed youth because of the simple fact that our skin, our blackness, conjures the myth of a hyper-violent negro…. We can’t wait for gradual and incremental change. Our government is a democracy, by the people and for the people. It is time for the people to wake up, stand up and demand change.”

During his acceptance speech at the annual Academy Awards ceremony in February 2015, Legend stated: “We say that Selma is now, because the struggle for justice is right now. We know that the Voting Rights Act that they fought for 50 years ago is being compromised right now in this country today. We know that right now, the struggle for freedom and justice is real. We live in the most incarcerated country in the world. There are more black men under correctional control today than were under slavery in 1850.”

In May 2015, Legend appeared on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart to discuss Southern Rites, his upcoming HBO documentary about systematic racism in Georgia. When Stewart said “I’m just struck by the anger and defensiveness on the side of people when you say racism still exists in America,” Legend replied: “Some racism is very easy to identify, the Donald Sterlings of the world, the people who use the N-word in a malicious way. But a lot of racism is structural.” Citing issues like sentencing, indictments and jury selection in the criminal justice system, Legend said that “all of these things … end up discounting the value of black lives…. We would love not have to keep bringing this up but it’s killing our kids, it’s resulting in so much pain and suffering for our community, so we have to bring it up.”

Mocking Piers Morgan’s Call for Black Rappers to Stop Using the “N-Word”

In November 2014, Legend attacked television host Piers Morgan for suggesting, in a Daily Mail article, that black entertainers should stop using the “N-word” in rap music lyrics because it “is a grotesque, odious, evil stain on the English language,” and “it symbolizes everything multi-cultural America has fought so hard to move on from — white-run, imperialist, violent, sexually malevolent barbarism.” Legend, in response, described Morgan’s remark as a “useless suggestion that completely misses the real issue.”

Supporter of Increased Spending on Early Childhood Education

In December 2014, Legend narrated part of a public service announcement to promote the Obama administration’s calls for increased spending on “early childhood education.”

Portraying the Criminal Justice System as Racist & Excessively Punitive

In an April 2015 interview with Texas Public Radio, Legend said: “We have a serious problem with incarceration in this country. It’s destroying families, it’s destroying communities and we’re the most incarcerated country in the world, and when you look deeper and look at the reasons we got to this place, we as a society made some choices politically and legislatively, culturally to deal with poverty, deal with mental illness in a certain way and that way usually involves using incarceration.” He also lamented the impact that serious penalties have upon one’s criminal record: “Once you have that tag of a felony on your name, it’s hard for you to do anything. Getting those reduced to misdemeanors really impacted a lot of lives and we hope to launch more initiatives like that around the country.”

Speaking at a crime victims’ conference in Sacramento in April 2015, Legend praised California’s Proposition 47, which had been passed by referendum in 2014 and was designed to reduce some nonviolent crimes from felonies to misdemeanors, thereby allowing many convicts to serve shorter jail sentences or avoid incarceration altogether. “Mass incarceration doesn’t make us safer,” he said. “It actually makes us all more vulnerable” by breaking up families and communities. “That’s what we’ve failed to grapple with over the past 40 years,” added Legend, “as we’ve criminalized more and more acts, and enacted harsher and harsher punishments.”

“A Concert for Progress on Race in America”

In November 2015, Legend performed at a star-studded Los Angeles concert called Shining A Light: A Concert for Progress on Race in America.

Abortion-Rights Extremist

In November 2015, Legend and his wife – both outspoken supporters of abortion rights — publicly announced that they periodically donated money to Planned Parenthood.

In April 2017, Legend was one of numerous artists to produce music whose proceeds were earmarked to support Planned Parenthood.

In June 2019,  Legend said that Hollywood should consider boycotting Georgia, Louisiana, Alabama, Kentucky, and other Republican-led states that were seeking to pass laws placing certain restrictions on access to abortion. “Particularly when these studios are hiring people and bringing people to the state and saying, ‘Come work with us here in this state,’ but if you get pregnant there you’re going to be treated like a second-class citizen,” said Legend. “That’s a tough conversation to have with your staff. And so I think hopefully the pressure that the studios are putting on will help Georgia and other states see the error of their ways.” Noting that “money talks,” Legend added that it “is just unconscionable to me” that any state would seek to place limits on women’s “freedom to make decisions about their bodies and when they want to have kids.”

On May 2, 2022, Politico reported that an unidentified individual had leaked an initial draft majority opinion, written by Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, in which the Court had decided, in the case known as Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, to strike down the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. “No draft decision in the modern history of the court has been disclosed publicly while a case was still pending,” said Politico. Whereas Roe had guaranteed federal constitutional protections for abortion rights, the new ruling would return responsibility for those rights to each individual state. “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start,” Alito wrote in his opinion, adding: “We hold that Roe and Casey [a 1992 decision that largely reaffirmed the rights set forth in Roe] must be overruled. It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives.”

In response to the Court’s reported decision in Dobbs, an outraged Legend issued a statement announcing that he and his wife, Chrissy Teigen, would be donating money to: (a) NNAF Abortion Funds, and (b) Keep Our Clinics. “I am outraged and dismayed that the U.S. Supreme Court appears ready to allow the government to invade women’s private health care decisions and strip them of rights the Court had upheld for 50 years,” Legend wrote in his statement. The right to abortion, he added, “is so fundamental to [women’s] humanity, so necessary for them to be full citizens and full participants in civic and professional life,” that “[w]e can’t call ourselves a free county without these core rights.”

Legend further argued: “You are not pro-life if you don’t believe in health care as a right. You are not pro-life if you are for weakening the social safety net so that struggling parents can’t afford to take care of their children…. You are not pro-life if you voted to allow every Tom, Dick and Harry to get whatever gun with whatever firing capacity they want as thousands die needlessly from gun deaths every year. You are not pro-life. You are pro-authoritarian control of women’s bodies.”

The “Climate Crisis”

Legend has long claimed that the Earth is in the midst of a potentially cataclysmic “climate crisis” caused largely by the greenhouse gas emissions associated with human activities like industry and travel.

• In 2015, he tweeted that “We CANNOT elect a president who isn’t serious about climate change.”
• In 2016, he posted a New York Times piece about rising sea levels and wrote the caption: “Shame on us if we elect a climate change denier.”
• In September 2020, he articulated his support for a global climate strike inspired by Greta Thunberg. “Young activists are challenging us to confront the realities of the climate crisis,” Legend tweeted. “Join me as I stand with @amnestyusa and @GretaThunberg today as we strike for climate.”

Legend & His Wife Choose the Gender of Their IVF Baby

In a February 2016 interview with People magazine, Legend’s wife, Chrissy Tiegen, revealed that she and her husband had selected the gender of their soon-to-be-born baby – a girl — while undergoing in-vitro fertilization (IVF).

Supporter of Hillary Clinton

In June 2016, Legend joined other notable Hollywood celebrities at a “She’s With Us” fundraiser for presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, an event held at the Greek Theater in Los Angeles.

Contempt for Donald Trump & His Supporters

In a March 11, 2016 Twitter exchange with Donald Trump Jr., Legend described Donald Trump Sr. — the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination — as “your racist father.” Trump Jr. then replied: “Here we go again. That can’t be the answer for everything you don’t like. That’s why the country is so divided now!” Legend, in turn, responded: “It’s just the answer when racist racists are saying racist shit and are endorsed by the KKK.”

Also in June 2016, Legend said at Variety’s TV Summit at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, California: “We are in a moment now where we have a major [presidential] candidate [Donald Trump] for office that is being very racist and divisive. I feel the need to call that out all the time because I don’t want us to feel like it’s impossible for our nation to go back to another dark place. We, as a nation, can’t go back to a dark place, and it could happen if we let the wrong person into office and impose the wrong regime on this country. I’m sure people in 1800s didn’t think they were evil people, but they allowed an evil institution to last for quite a long time. We, as people who believe in equality and diversity and believe that every human being in this life matters, we need to be vigilant in making sure that we don’t elect leaders who are contradicting that belief.”

In an August 2016 interview with the Daily Beast, Legend effusively praised Michelle and Barack Obama while asserting that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump had “made it very clear how his temperament is, how his personality is, what his level of intellectual depth is when it comes to policy, and he’s made it abundantly clear that he’s utterly unqualified to be president — no matter what your political views are.” “Trump’s been a public personality forever and that’s fine if you want him to be a reality-TV host,” Legend added, “but if you want him to be president there’s a different standard. And remember, his entry into being a Republican was questioning the citizenship of the first black president. We know who he is, he’s made it clear who he is, and now it’s time to show up and vote. He never was a winning candidate.”

Deeply upset by Donald Trump’s presidential victory in November 2016, Legend warned that the president-elect’s “Hitler-level” rhetoric could cause the U.S. to increasingly resemble Nazi Germany. “I feel like it’s dangerous for us to be complacent,” Legend explained. “It’s dangerous for us to think that it couldn’t happen to us like it happened to Germany in the ’30s and ’40s. Trump is saying Hitler-level things in public. The world and America have done some atrocious things in the past, and we could do it again if we had the wrong leadership and if people of conscience don’t speak up.”

In December 2016, Legend told TV host Trevor Noah that he was “worried” about how the incoming Trump administration would treat left-wing groups like Planned Parenthood, the ACLU, and the NAACP. “All these places that are out there trying to protect the people from an oppressive government and from people that would want to take their rights away,” said Legend. “And so we all need to be involved and be vigilant and pay attention to what the government is doing under our name and with our money and hold them accountable and support organizations that are fighting the power.”

By April 2017 — less than four months into the Trump presidency — Legend suggested that Trump had “already done enough to be impeached.” In an interview with the Independent, the singer also suggested that Trump was the embodiment of the typical “Christian white straight man” who favored a “backlash against anything that celebrates another type of existence, whether it’s women, LGBTQ, [or] people of color.” “Now it’s just a matter of when Congress has the guts to do it,” said Legend. “And it may not happen until after 2018, but it [impeachment] may happen sooner if enough evidence is presented against him. I’m not super optimistic for a Mike Pence presidency either, but at least I think he’s not insane. He doesn’t seem like he’s a psycho.” “There are some that feel like any type of inclusion, any interruption of the overall domination of white men, is some kind of front,” Legend added.

In a brief interview with TMZ at the Time 100 Gala in April 2017, Legend said of President Trump: “I think he’s a terrible president. He’s manifestly unqualified. Not curious. Not good at legislating or doing anything that his job requires. Doesn’t have any depth about any subject. And he’s also using the office of the presidency as a way to make money for himself with his businesses, so he’s corrupt. I can’t say anything nice about the guy, I think he’s one of the worst people I’ve ever encountered in public life.”

On June 1, 2017 – immediately after President Trump had pulled the U.S. out of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement –Legend tweeted that “[w]e have to stop this asshole”

In September 2017,  Legend put out a casting call in an effort to find eight white men and women between the ages of 30 and 65 — and “preferably out of shape” — to portray, in an upcoming music video, “Trump supporters” protesting at a political rally. There were also calls for ten “young and blonde” actors aged 18-35 — preferably with “very short hair or short on sides, long on top” — to play the roles of “white, male protestors” of the so-called “alt-right” in a music video. Moreover, there were calls for eight black men and women aged 18-35 to play Black Lives Matter protesters, and for two female actresses “who are willing to kiss on camera” to “show that there is no segregation in love.”

On June 14, 2018, Legend’s wife Chrissy Teigen tweeted that to commemorate President Trump’s 72nd birthday, she and members of her family were donating  $72,000 each to the ACLU, an organization whose values and agendas were largely the antithesis of Trump’s. Specifically, Tiegen lauded the ACLU’s quest to “defen[d] the rights and humanity” of “immigrant families” that were “ being ripped apart” by the “cruel,” “anti-family,”  and “inhumane policies of the Trump administration.” Tiegen also praised the ACLU for “advocating for reproductive rights, voting rights, criminal justice reform, LGBT rights, 1st amendment rights and holding the Trump administration accountable wherever possible.”

In the aftermath of two mass shootings that killed 51 people in two New Zealand mosques on March 15, 2019, Legend claimed that President Trump was in large measure responsible for creating the political climate that had led to those massacres. Said Legend in an interview:

• “That [Trump’s] rhetoric of invasion, that rhetoric of violence, of scaring white people to think that these brown people are going to rape and kill their families — that rhetoric is inspiring people to do these kind of massacres.”
• “He [Trump] needs to apologize for demonizing brown people who have tried to come here and have a better life.”
• “I think what’s clear is that there is an issue around the world, and particularly in this country, in America, when it comes to the evil rhetoric and ideology of white supremacy. This ideology and this rhetoric has been spread, a lot of it on the internet, but a lot of it has been either endorsed or tacitly kind of winked at by our president.”
• “When people of such influence and such stature [as Trump] are endorsing such a hateful and evil ideology it emboldens those who will go out and do something evil and nasty like what happened in New Zealand.”
• “A lot of the inspiration is coming from America right now and the American president. Our American president needs to say this is evil, I don’t endorse it, I don’t embrace it, I’m not winking at it, I’m not equivocating about it. This is evil and I speak out against it.”

In April 2019, Legend and his wife, Chrissy Teigen, headlined a Democratic Party conference at the Lansdowne Resort, a posh hotel and golf club in Northern Virginia, where the singer stated that his wife “knew well before a lot of America did that [Trump] was a joke and a conman and a clown,” noting that “ she was prescient long before he ever thought about running for president.”

In a July 30, 2019 interview with TMZ, Legend condemned President Trump for having recently described the Democrat-run city of Baltimore as “a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess.” Said Legend: “Our president is a flaming racist. He’s a piece of shit…. We need to get him out of office…. We need to focus on making all of our communities better instead of talking shit about our communities just because you’re a racist prick. Donald Trump is an evil fucking canker sore on America’s whole landscape. So we need to get him out of office.”

In the wake of two mass shootings – one in in El Paso, Texas and the other in Dayton, Ohio – that killed 29 people during the same weekend in early August 2019, Legend posted a tweet in which he blamed the massacres on President Trump: “When we condemn the racist venom coming from the President’s mouth and point out the bigotry of his policies, it’s not an academic question, it’s not a political game, it’s about life and death. The President regularly inspires killers. He is a part of the problem.”

In an October 2019 Vanity Fair cover story, Legend said that President Trump “just proves himself to be a shitty human being every day.”

In a November 2019 Twitter post, Legend called President Trump “a cancer” that “needs to be removed from office as soon as possible,”

In February 2020, Legend lamented “all the evil, all the corruption that Trump has unleashed in the last few years.” “We now have a president who embarrasses this country,” he added.

In an August 2020 interview with Variety, Legend — a longtime supporter of, and fundraiser for, Planned Parenthood, which was founded by the famous eugenicist Margaret Sanger — said: “President Trump is obviously a bigot. He’s been a bigot his entire life. I believe he is a eugenicist — he’s not capable of leading the country when we have moments of racial unrest and responses to racism. We’re always going to be a weaker nation with him in charge, and it is an urgent priority that he is not in charge.”

In a November 2, 2020 speech at a Biden-Harris campaign rally in Philadelphia, Legend stated that President Trump “actively encourages police brutality and cannot bring himself to condemn white supremacists or neo-Nazis.”

On November 7, 2020, after mainstream media had declared Joe Biden the projected winner of the presidential election — Legend and his wife Chrissy Teigen took to social media to share video of themselves dancing to the song “FDT” (Fuck Donald Trump), which was written and performed by the rapper YG (real name Keenon Dequan Ray Jackson). A sample of the song’s lyrics:

Yeah, nigga, fuck Donald Trump
Yeah, yeah, fuck Donald Trump
I got a question
How’d he make it this far? How the fuck did it begin?
A Trump rally sounds like Hitler in Berlin
Or KKK shit, now I’m goin’ in
I’m just sayin’ what’s real, I don’t give a fuck who I offend
‘Cause it’s gotta be said, it’s gotta be said
It’s off the top like the toupee on Donald Trump’s head
This man’s not peaceful, racism’s evil
This man hates Muslims, that’s a billion fuckin’ people
If truth be told, Donald is a terrorist

Outspoken on His Social Media Account

During the keynote discussion at the same Variety TV Summit, moderator Variety’s Debra Birnbaum asked Legend to explain why he tended to be extremely vocal on Twitter. “Some people want me to shut up and sing,” he answered, … I can’t just sit by and watch…. I can’t sit by and let this stuff happen without trying to influence people. It’s worth it to me. “

Claiming That The Star Spangled Banner Is a Racist Song

In an August 2016 tweet, Legend said that The Star-Spangled Banner was “a weak song.” He also endorsed an article in the Intercept, titled “Colin Kaepernick Is Righter Than You Know: The National Anthem Is a Celebration of Slavery.” In the body of its text, that article stated: “Almost no one seems to be aware that even if the U.S. were a perfect country today, it would be bizarre to expect African-American players to stand for ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’ Why? Because it literally celebrates the murder of African-Americans.”

In an August 2016 interview with the Daily Beast, Legend effusively praised Michelle and Barack Obama while asserting that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump had “made it very clear how his temperament is, how his personality is, what his level of intellectual depth is when it comes to policy, and he’s made it abundantly clear that he’s utterly unqualified to be president — no matter what your political views are.” “Trump’s been a public personality forever and that’s fine if you want him to be a reality-TV host,” Legend added, “but if you want him to be president there’s a different standard. And remember, his entry into being a Republican was questioning the citizenship of the first black president. We know who he is, he’s made it clear who he is, and now it’s time to show up and vote. He never was a winning candidate.”

Recipient of “Social Justice” Award

In May 2017 at Salem State University, Legend became the first recipient of the “Salem Advocate for Social Justice” award, which was presented to him by the Salem Award Foundation for Human Rights and Social Justice. The award was established for “recognized leaders in their field who use their platform to raise voices and advocate for human rights and social justice.” Legend was honored specifically for what the Foundation described as “his work to curb mass incarceration and provide access to education through his nonprofit, The Show Me Campaign.”

Supporter of Obamacare

In May 2017, Legend called for Democrat candidates nationwide to do everything in their power to “oust [R]epublicans,” who wished to repeal and replace The Affordable Care Act – i.e., Obamacare — President Obama’s signature achievement.

Jesus Christ Superstar

Just ahead of Easter 2018, Legend appeared as Jesus Christ in an NBC production of Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert.

Opponent of Presiudent Trump’s Immigration & Border Policies

On June 16, 2018, Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan tweeted an early Father’s Day message that said: “My life changed the day I became a father. Liza, Charlie, and Sam are my highest priority. Wishing all of the dads out there a happy early #FathersDay.” In response to Ryan’s tweet, Legend said: “Seriously, fuck you. Reunite the families at the border and we can talk about father’s day.”

At an April 2019 Democratic Party conference at the Lansdowne Resort in Northern Virginia, Legend asserted that America should be “big, bold, and generous, and open” with regard to the massive hordes of migrants seeking to illegally cross America’s southern borber. “They’re coming to give to America,” he said. “They’re coming to contribute to America.”

Supporting Public Harassment of Trump Administration Officials

In June 2018, Legend told TMZ that he did not believe that Rep. Maxine Waters’ recent call for public harassment of Trump administration officials would hurt the Democrats in the upcoming 2018 midterm elections. “No, that’s ridiculous. Maxine is the O.G. and she did a great job, she called them out.”[1]

On June 25, 2018, Legend appeared to endorse Waters’ calls for public harassment of Trump officials when he tweeted: “Let’s make a deal with the Trump Administration. Reunite all these families immediately and you can go out to eat wherever the fuck you want.”

In June 2018 as well, TMZ asked Legend how he felt about actress Claudia Jordan’s sarcastic suggestion that White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and seven family members had recently been asked to leave the Red Hen Restaurant in Lexington, Virginia because she was overweight rather than because she worked for President Trump. Legend retorted angrily: “Ask me, should we be reuniting 2,000 kids with their parents? Ask me that. I don’t care about fucking Sarah Sanders. Reunite the fucking kids with their families and then we’ll talk about Sarah Sanders and her fucking dinners.” “Bottom line is that I’m very comfortable with a non violent form of social censure being visited upon people who implement and defend such intentionally harmful policies,” Legend tweeted on June 25. “Far less pain is being visited upon Sarah et al than these families at the border. Shame on the whole lot.”

Opponent of Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh

In September 2018, Legend appeared in a video ad produced by the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund opposing President Trump’s nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s to the U.S. Supreme Court. “Who becomes the next Supreme Court Justice is the decision of a lifetime — your lifetime,” Legend says in the ad. “Brett Kavanaugh’s troubling views on the issues that matter most and his rushed confirmation process make him unfit for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court. This fall, your senators will vote on Kavanaugh. How they vote will impact you for a lifetime. Tell them to vote no on Kavanaugh. Remember, they answer to you.”

Supporting Elizabeth Warren for President in 2020

In October 2019, Legend indicated his support for Senator Elizabeth Warren’s 2020 presidential campaign, stating that “[s]he’s the best candidate running today and she comes at it with joy and with sincerity and with a wealth of knowledge and experience.”

While campaigning for Warren in South Carolina in February 2020, Legend — telling those in attendance that we “cannot wait any longer to undo all the evil, all the corruption that Trump has unleashed in the last few years” – lamented that “[w]e [now] have a president who embarrasses this country.” “Wouldn’t it be refreshing to have a woman of Senator Warren’s brilliance replacing him?” asked the singer. In particular, Legend voiced his approval of the fact that Warren “supports creating a commission on reparations for the descendants of enslaved people.”

Environmentalist Hypocrisy

In February 2020, Legend and his wife Chrissy Tiegen – both of whom had long warned that the greenhouse emissions from human activities like industry had created a potentially catastrophic “climate crisis” — flew 500 miles on a private luxury jet in order to dine at the exclusive French Laundry restaurant in Yountville, California, for their Valentine’s Day date. Tiegen, for her part, used social media to share photos of the couple aboard the plane as they headed toward their destination.

Supporting Joe Biden & Kamala Harris for President in 2020

On June 11, 2020, Legend teamed up with Barbra Streisand to headline a virtual fundraiser for Joe Biden’s presidential campaign.

During the 2020 Democratic National Convention in August.2020, Legend performed on behalf of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

On January 20, 2021, Legend performed at a primetime “Celebrating America” special in honor of Joe Biden’s inauguration.

Supporter of Defunding the Police

In a series of tweets in June 2020, Legend defended efforts that were being made to defund the police departments in cities across the United States. “I know this word ‘defund’ has caused some controversy, even from some who are inclined to agree with a lot of the underlying arguments,” Legend wrote. “Police funding takes up a huge portion of our local budgets. Budgets are moral documents which spell out in black and white what our priorities are. We have finite amounts of money to spend and right now we spend far too much on policing.” Moreover, Legend explained that “defund the police” did not mean eliminating law enforcement entirely, but rather: “It means there should be significantly fewer police and more professionals of other types with expertise in their fields, whether it’s social work, health care, conflict resolution, drug treatment, etc.”

That same month, Legend doubled down on his calls to defund the police, saying: “When you hear people talking about defunding the police and decarceration, so many of them are saying, ‘There’s got to be a better way to deal with these issues.’ If you treat people with mental health and drug addiction issues like you truly care about their well-being and value their lives, you would know that jail is not the solution…. If we spend the money on the front end, so that folks have a chance to succeed, then we don’t have to spend it on the back end, paying a bunch of cops and building a bunch of prisons and all these other things that are really expensive and destructive for our society.”

“We’ve come to the realization that these accounts from the police are almost never to be believed,” Legend added, “particularly when they don’t admit any wrongdoing, because almost every single time it doesn’t match up with what’s on the camera. Camera phones and social media have been a significant difference in this whole movement. These conversations and these uprisings have been happening for literally decades, and nobody believed us when we said this isn’t fair, we’re being abused, we’re being killed with no accountability. People didn’t believe us, and now they finally do because the proof is there.”

Supporter of Black Lives Matter & the Street Protests of 2020

In June 2020 as well, Legend specifically lauded Patrisse Cullors, the self-proclaimed “trained Marxist” who had co-founded the Black Lives Matter several years earlier, as someone who had been quick to notice the effects of racism in American society and police forces, even before the massive wave of protests in 2020 began. “These protests are very important, and they get a lot of media attention and have been really moving for the country,” said Legend. “But they start to kind of die down, and that’s when a lot of the work has to happen still.”

Moreover, Legend expressed his deep admiration for those who had taken to the streets in protest: “There are several moments you can call emancipation days for Black America. Juneteenth commemorates that they were always meant to be free, but in this nation, they weren’t. I’m so inspired watching people marching in these streets, for people marching in Selma [Ala.], marching in Ferguson [Mo.], trying to get more free.”

Bailing out Arrested Black Lives Matter Rioters

After George Floyd’s infamous death at the hands of a white police officer sparked widespread violent demonstrations and riots in May 2020, Legend announced in a tweet that he and his wife would be donating money to pay bail costs for Black Lives Matter rioters who had been arrested and detained” “Chrissy and I will be donating to these 3 organizations which are organizing, supporting and defending those marching for justice:  @Mvmnt4BlkLives    @nlgnews  @bailproject.” Teigen, meanwhile, pledged to personally contribute $200,000 to bail out such offenders.

Opponent of Election-Integrity Measures

In March 2021, Legend joined an extensive list of celebrities who endorsed former First Lady Michelle Obama’s aggressive campaign to promote the passage of the 791-page “For the People Act.” If signed into law, this legislation would, as the Heritage Foundation explained:

• “seize the authority of states to regulate voter registration and the voting process by forcing states to implement early voting, automatic voter registration, same-day registration, online voter registration, and no-fault absentee balloting.”
• “make it easier to commit fraud and promote chaos at the polls through same-day registration.”
• implement “15 days of mandated early voting,” so that “voters who vote early don’t have the same information as those who vote on Election Day [will miss] late-breaking developments that could affect their choices.”
• “degrade the accuracy of registration lists by requiring states to automatically register all individuals (as opposed to ‘citizens’) from state and federal databases.”
• “constitute a recipe for massive voter registration fraud by hackers and cyber criminals through online voter registration that is not tied to an existing state record, such as a driver’s license.”
• “require states to count ballots cast by voters outside of their assigned precincts, overriding the precinct system used by almost all states that allows election officials to monitor votes, staff polling places, provide enough ballots, and prevent election fraud.”
• “mandate no-fault absentee ballots, which are the tool of choice for vote thieves.”
• “ban witness signature or notarization requirements for absentee ballots”
• “require states to allow vote trafficking (vote harvesting) so that any third parties—including campaign staffers and political consultants—can pick up and deliver absentee ballots.”
• “prevent election officials from checking the eligibility and qualifications of voters and removing ineligible voters.”
• “ban state voter ID laws by forcing states to allow individuals to vote without an ID [by] merely signing a statement in which they claim they are who they say they are.”

Supporter of George Soros-Backed Prosecutors

In April 2022, Legend announced his support for various George Soros-backed district attorney candidates, including Chesa Boudin of San Francisco and Diana Becton of Contra Costa County, California. “District Attorney elections are crucial to improving our criminal legal system and 2022 is a year with thousands of races,” Legend tweeted. “These are the upcoming elections in TN, NC, OR, and CA I am paying close attention to.”

Additional Information

Legend sits on the advisory board of The Bail Project — a left-wing group whose twofold mission is to: (a) “restore the presumption of innocence, reunite families, and challenge a system that criminalizes race and poverty,” and (b) “end cash bail and create a more just, equitable, and humane pretrial system.”

He also serves on the American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ Committee on Anti-Racism.

As of April 2023, Legend had an estimated net worth of at least $100 million.

Footnotes:

1. On June 24, 2018, Waters encouraged Americans to rise up and harass members of the Trump administration wherever they might appear in public places. “If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them, and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere,” the congresswoman told a crowd of supporters. And in a message to the president himself, Waters said: “Already you have members of your cabinet that are being booed out of restaurants, who have protesters taking up at their house. No peace, no sleep. No peace, no sleep.” And during an interview on MSNBC, Waters stated: “I have no sympathy for these people that are in this administration. For these members of his cabinet who remain and try to defend him – they are not going to be able to go to a restaurant they are not going to be able to stop at a gas station they are not going to be able to shop at a department store.”