Bette Midler is getting criticism on Twitter for asking Beyonce’s Instagram followers, all 133 million of them, for help in defeating Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election, Yahoo Entertainment reports.
On Thursday night, Midler, who has 1.7 million Twitter followers as of this writing, tweeted that Beyonce, who has 133 million Instagram followers, should mobilize her fan base, colloquially called the “Behyhive,” to the polls, in order to defeat Trump.
“#Beyoncé has 133 million Instagram followers. More than double the people who voted for Trump. Wouldn’t it be amazing if the #BeyHive mobilized to defeat him?”
Further, she noted the fact that the word “BeyHive” derives from “beehive,” and suggested that actual bees get in on the act as well.
“I also wouldn’t mind if a regular bee hive f*ked his s*t up.”
Beyonce’s fans, and indeed people who aren’t fans but who didn’t care for the tweet, quickly chimed in with criticism of the singer’s call to action. The main point of contention seemed to be that Midler, who is white, was calling on a black woman and her fanbase, the majority of which is likely black, to effectively come to the aid of a white liberal.
“Hi, white liberals need to stop pressuring black people into saving us. Black women are already very invested in the party-even though the party has often abandoned them,” tweeted user @magi_jay, who also suggested that this message might have had more resonance with Katy Perry or Taylor Swift.
Other users echoed the same sentiment. User @TorraineWalker, for example, noted that 53 percent of white women voted for Trump, and so white women should take responsibility for the president.
Still others pointed out that Beyonce has fans all over the world, many of whom wouldn’t be able to vote in an American election.
Beyonce, for her part, does not appear to be much of a fan of Trump. In October 2018, as The Evening Standard reported, Mrs. Carter and her husband, Jay-Z, ended their friendship with Kim Kardashian and Kanye West over Kanye’s pro-Trump statements.
As of this writing, however, Beyonce does not appear to have responded to Midler invoking her to help fight against Trump.
This is not the first time that Midler, an outspoken Trump critic, has been accused of crossing a line when it comes to Trump. In July, as reported by The Inquisitr , Midler was called “racist” after she referred to black Trump supporters as “blackground.”