The Department of Homeland Security was forced to remove MGMTs Little Dark Age hit by an ICE recruitment drive on social media after the band filed a takedown request.
MGMT accused the department of using their 2017 song to accompany a “propaganda video” in a statement.
The video shared by DHS on October 23 showed federal agents arresting protesters outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Portland, Oregon.
The caption read: ‘End of the Dark Age, beginning of the Golden Age.’
“MGMT is aware that ‘Little Dark Age’ is featured in a Department of Homeland Security propaganda video and has filed a takedown notice for the unauthorized use of their music,” the band said in a brief statement on Instagram.
DHS completely removed the video from its X account, but it remained active Instagram without the MGMT number. The video and song remained on DHS Blue sky bill from Saturday evening.
MGMT, founded in 2002 by Andrew VanWyngarden and Benjamin Goldwasser, revealed that the single, from an album of the same name, was written after President Donald Trump won the 2016 election.
“Apparently we were more inspired to write pop music after evil took over the world,” VanWyngarden said Rolling stone in 2018.
The band’s outraged fans responded to Homeland Security’s Instagram post before the song was removed.
“MGMT would never support this,” one fan wrote. “Please do not use their music to advance your disturbing and hateful story.”
“The irony is that Little Dark Age is about how bad this stuff is,” said another.
“Little Dark Age is literally about the dark days of Trump’s first presidency, lol the irony,” someone else wrote.
Far-right groups have claimed the song in recent years. It was “by far the most popular sound among extremist creators on TikTok,” after becoming part of a viral trend on the social media platform in 2021, according to a report by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue in the United Kingdom
Other artists have hit DHS with takedown notices for copyright infringement for using their music on social media to promote the Trump administration’s anti-immigration agenda.
DHS had to remove a social media post earlier this month over The Cure’s use Friday I’m in love.
Over the summer, the department also had to remove a post after using Jay Z’s Public service announcement to promote ICE recruitment.
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