No, Taylor Swift’s boyfriend Travis Kelce didn’t say he could ‘twist’ Elon Musk ‘into a pretzel’

Moments after the 2024 presidential debate ended, singer-songwriter Taylor Swift threw her support behind Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris, writing on Instagram that Harris "fights for the rights and causes I believe need a warrior to champion them."

Swift posed with one of her three cats, Benjamin Button, and signed the endorsement "Taylor Swift, childless cat lady," in a dig at comments by Ohio Sen. JD Vance, the Republican vice presidential nominee.

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A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift)

Entrepreneur Elon Musk, who supports former President Donald Trump in the presidential race, responded to Swift’s endorsement on his X platform. 

"Fine Taylor … you win … I will give you a child and guard your cats with my life," wrote Musk, who has fathered at least 12 children with three different women. He has amplified inaccurate claims that Western countries are experiencing a population collapse and argued he is "doing my part" to combat it. 

Musk critics and Swift supporters derided Musk’s remarks as "sexist, controversial," and "creepy." Vanity Fair characterized the post as "a disturbing sexual comment."

One person who hasn’t responded? Swift’s boyfriend, National Football League player Travis Kelce. 

However, that fact didn’t stop social media users from circulating a fake X post screenshot as if it were a rebuttal from Kelce, the Kansas City Chiefs’ tight end. 

"I’m 6’5" and actually play football," read a screenshot shared Sept. 12 on Threads that purported to show Kelce’s reply. "The fact I went to college and got a degree and worked hard might be lost on you. I don’t play backgammon but I do play chess. I could also twist you into a pretzel."

(Screenshot from Threads)

Featured Fact-check

Viral image

stated on August 19, 2024 in a Facebook post

“Travis Kelce kneels during national anthem fined $10 million and thrown out of the game.”

This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and Threads.)

PolitiFact found no evidence that Kelce, who earned his degree in 2022 from the University of Cincinnati, wrote those things. Using an advanced search on X, we looked for posts from his handle, @tkelce, and for the phrase "actually play football," and found no results. As of 3 p.m. ET Sept. 13, Kelce’s X account showed no posts or replies since Sept. 9. 

We contacted Kelce and received no response before publication. 

The language from the alleged Kelce post is copied from an inside joke that stems from "trash talk between a Baltimore Orioles fan" and someone behind the baseball blog TalkNats.com (Nats being the Washington Nationals), The Cincinnati Enquirer reported. The only difference is that the fake Kelce post says "football" instead of "baseball."

The earliest appearance online of the screenshot that we could find using a reverse image search was shared by X user @theABinKC, who told PolitiFact in a direct message that he created the fake screenshot.

Like Kelce, Swift has not publicly responded to Musk’s X post. 

When accepting an award Sept. 11 at the MTV Video Music Awards, however, Swift again urged people to register to vote. 

Swift endorsed President Joe Biden in 2020 with a platter of cookies bearing the Biden-Harris campaign logo. Experts say it often takes more than a single message or action for celebrity endorsements to move the needle on elections.

A Threads post shared an image that it said shows Kelce responding to a Musk X post. We rate that claim False.

PolitiFact Audience Engagement Producer Ellen Hine contributed to this report.

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