LOS ANGELES – A plume of smoke and fire bloomed over an Iranian port facility in footage the White House labeled “unclassified,” while the audio resolved into something instantly recognizable: “Boom, boom, boom,” Katy Perry sang, “even brighter than the moon.” The caption read: “Iran has been warned.” The nine-second clip was posted Thursday to the official @WhiteHouse TikTok account. By Friday, its author had a response.
Perry has spoken in interviews for years about writing “Firework” in 2010 during a period of personal crisis, designing its chorus specifically to reach people searching for any spark in themselves. The song went platinum many times over and became a fixture in school counseling programs, LGBTQ advocacy campaigns, and sports arenas precisely because it carries no political edge. The White House found a use for that neutrality its author never anticipated.
“I am deeply appalled and angry to see ‘Firework’ used on the @WhiteHouse TikTok account as a backing track for video footage of military strikes,” Perry wrote on X. She said she had not been asked, had not approved the use, and would not condone it. She described the song as an “anthem of hope, healing, and inner strength for people going through their darkest personal moments” and said the administration’s deployment of it had turned her message inside out. “To see a message of self-worth and upliftment weaponized to soundtrack destruction and violence is a complete violation of everything my song stands for,” she wrote. “My music is for bringing people together, not celebrating warfare.”
As of publication, the White House had not responded to Perry’s statement. Whether her team has filed a takedown notice with TikTok, and whether attorneys are considering any further action, has not been addressed publicly. The clip’s audio status on the platform was unconfirmed at the time of writing.
The incident fits a pattern the Trump administration’s social media team has built steadily across 2026: attaching recognizable commercial recordings to official content, from immigration enforcement clips to military footage, without obtaining synchronization licenses or the consent of the artists involved. The pattern drew sustained public attention in June, when the White House used Ariana Grande’s song “bye” as the backdrop for a TikTok clip of ICE agents carrying out arrests. Grande responded directly in the platform’s comments, writing that the administration should “not ever” use her music “in relation to this barbaric, inhumane, heinous nonsense,” according to Euronews. Her team had the audio removed through TikTok’s standard copyright process; the video remains available but silent.
Kesha’s “Blow” appeared next, set against a clip of fighter jets under the caption “Lethality.” Kesha wrote that she “absolutely” did not approve of her music being used to promote violence. Sabrina Carpenter’s “Juno” was deployed in a separate ICE enforcement montage; Carpenter called it “evil and disgusting” and demanded the administration not involve her or her work in its agenda. Noah Kahan and Olivia Rodrigo have made similar objections at other points across the year.
The consistency raises questions the artists are not positioned to answer. Whether the White House’s social media operation works under any legal theory – government fair use, a blanket sync license, or some other framework – has not been explained publicly. The administration has not described any internal clearance process for the music it attaches to official posts.
What is clear is that each public objection generates attention. When Perry posted on X on Friday, her statement circulated far more widely than the nine-second clip had on its own. That dynamic may explain something about the administration’s approach: the confrontations are, at minimum, not functioning as a deterrent.
“Firework” has a specific cultural weight that distinguishes this incident. The song peaked on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2011 and has remained in continuous circulation since – a standard in televised athletics, a recurring fixture at school events, a recording Perry has credited in interviews as having been written to address suicidal despair. It arrived on the Grammy-nominated album Teenage Dream and is, in her own telling, the work she is most identified with as a statement of artistic purpose. The Hollywood Reporter noted that the gap between the song’s intent and its co-optation represented the starkest contrast yet in the administration’s string of unauthorized uses.
The White House posted the video on Thursday during an active period of the ongoing Iran war, a military campaign that has drawn domestic opposition running, in recent polling, at roughly seven in ten Americans. The administration’s decision to frame the strikes in TikTok’s short-video format, backed by a chart-topping pop chorus, reflected a particular calculation about how military action is presented to an audience accustomed to a 15-second scroll.
Perry has not said whether she expects a response from the administration or considers the matter settled. The White House has not indicated any change in its social media music practices. What it will post next – and whether those choices will again borrow from someone else’s catalog without asking – is not known.
