Last year, the Republican presidential candidate, Vivek Ramaswamy, was reportedly threatened by Eminem for using his song Lose Yourself while campaigning at the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines.
Ramaswamy’s campaign attorney, Stephen Roberts, received a cease-and-desist letter from Eminem’s music performing rights organisation BMI, which read that BMI had “received a communication from Marshall B. Mathers III, professionally known as Eminem, objecting to the Vivek Ramaswamy campaign’s use of Eminem‘s musical compositions. BMI will consider any performance of the Eminem Works by the Vivek 2024 campaign from this date forward to be a material breach of the Agreement for which BMI reserves all rights and remedies.”
After Ramaswamy learned about the letter, he taunted the Grammy winner on his X, “Will The REAL Slim Shady Please Stand Up? He didn’t just say what I think he did, did he?” He also tagged Eminem with a grinning face sweat emoji.
However, Ramaswamy backed down after receiving a legal threat from Eminem. When asked about the letter, he told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell, “I’ll respect his wishes,” adding, “..but I’ll just say, will the real Slim Shady please stand up?” referring to his 2000 song The Real Slim Shady.
He continued, “Eminem, in his rise, used to be a guy who stood up to the establishment and said the things that the establishment didn’t want him to say. I think the fact that my political viewpoints may differ from his — I think people will change over the course of their lives. But I hope he will one day rediscover the renegade that made him great. And I’m rooting for that success in his life.”
But this wasn’t the first time Ramaswamy rapped the song in public. When he attended his senior year at Harvard University in 2006, the businessman echoed the lyrics under the alter ego “Da Vek.”
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