PHILADELPHIA -- Beyoncé is expected to appear Friday in her hometown of Houston at a rally for Vice-President Kamala Harris, according to three people familiar with the matter.
Harris's presidential campaign has taken on Beyonce's 2016 track âFreedomâ as its anthem, and the singer's planned appearance brings a high-level of star power to what has become a key theme of the Democratic nomineeâs bid: freedom.
Harris headed to the reliably Republican state just 10 days before Election Day in an effort to refocus her campaign against former U.S. president Donald Trump on reproductive care, which Democrats see as a make-or-break issue this year.
The three people were not authorized to publicly discuss the matter and spoke on condition of anonymity. The Harris campaign did not immediately comment.
Beyoncéâs appearance was expected to draw even more attention to the event â and to Harrisâs closing message.
Harrisâs Houston trip is set to feature women who have been affected by Texas' restrictive abortion laws, which took effect after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. She has campaigned in other states with restrictive abortion laws, including Georgia, among the seven most closely contested states.
Harris has centered her campaign around the idea that Trump is a threat to American freedoms, from reproductive and LGBTQ rights to the freedom to be safe from gun violence.
Beyoncé gave Harris permission early in her campaign to use âFreedom,â a soulful track from her 2016 landmark album âLemonade,â in her debut ad. Harris has used its thumping chorus as a walk-out song at rallies ever since.
Beyoncéâs alignment with Harris isnât the first time that the Grammy winner has aligned with a Democratic politician. Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, danced as Beyoncé performed at a presidential inaugural ball in 2009.
In 2013, she sang the national anthem at Obamaâs second inauguration. Three years later, she and her husband Jay-Z performed at a pre-election concert for Democratic Hillary Clinton in Cleveland.
âLook how far weâve come from having no voice to being on the brink of history â again,â Beyoncé said at the time. âBut we have to vote.â
Speculation over whether the superstar would appear at this summerâs Democratic National Convention in Chicago reached a fever pitch on the gatheringâs final night, with online rumours swirling after celebrity news site TMZ posted a story that said: âBeyoncé is in Chicago, and getting ready to pop out for Kamala Harris on the final night of the Democratic convention.â The site attributed it to âmultiple sources in the know,â none of them named.
About an hour after Harris ended her speech, TMZ updated its story to say, âTo quote the great Beyoncé: We gotta lay our cards down, down, down ... we got this one wrong.â In the end, Harris took the stage to starâs song, but that was its only appearance.
Last year, Harris and her husband, Doug Emhoff, attended Beyoncéâs Renaissance World Tour in Maryland after getting tickets from Beyoncé herself. âThanks for a fun date night, @Beyonce,â Harris wrote on Instagram.