10 Musicians Who Later Became Politicians

A co-founder of the jam band Phish (named after him, because the story often goes), drummer Jon Fishman loved a short stint in native politics. Between endorsing Sen. Bernie Sanders within the 2016 and 2020 Democratic primaries and acting at his marketing campaign occasions, he advocated — together with Nirvana’s Novoselic — for ranked-choice voting in statewide elections in Maine, which grew to become the primary state within the nation to undertake the system in 2018. In 2017, he received a seat on the choose board of Lincolnville, Maine, the tiny coastal city that had been his dwelling for a decade. “Bernie was saying, ‘Take a look at all of you individuals who obtained on the Sanders marketing campaign and cared about these points, you must run to your native places of work,’” Fishman mentioned on the time. “I may sit on my butt someplace and never be engaged, however we do have a private stake within the well-being of the city.” He didn’t run for reelection in 2020, however, in equity, it was most likely exhausting to steadiness continued Phish excursions with common administrative conferences.

The musician-turned-politician who seemingly involves thoughts first for hundreds of thousands of People is, after all, Sonny Bono, half of the married-for-a-decade duo Sonny & Cher. With hit songs of the Sixties like “I Received You Babe” and a few Seventies selection reveals, the couple had been popular culture royalty. Whereas Cher was the extra celebrated singer, Bono turned out to be a mainstay of tv as each host and a visitor star throughout many collection. Fed up with what he noticed as regulatory purple tape stopping him from opening a restaurant in Palm Springs, California, he ran for mayor of the desert metropolis and served from 1988 till 1992, when he made an unsuccessful bid to safe the Republican nomination for one in every of California’s Senate seats. In 1994, he received a race to exchange a retiring incumbent representing California’s forty fourth District, masking a part of southern Los Angeles, and held that workplace till his demise in a snowboarding accident 4 years later. Whereas in Congress, Bono criticized GOP Home Speaker Newt Gingrich for his method to media appearances and advocated for environmental restoration tasks in California. A regulation extending copyright phrases, handed after he died, was named in his honor, given his sponsorship of an earlier model of the invoice. Amongst all who’ve ever served in U.S. Congress, Bono is the one particular person with a primary pop single to his title.

The frontman and founding member of soppy rock band Orleans, John Corridor was additionally a session musician and songwriter for the likes of Janis Joplin, Bonnie Raitt, and Jackson Browne. He co-wrote his band’s greatest Seventies hits, “Dance with Me” and “Nonetheless the One” — the latter used with out permission by the presidential campaigns of George W. Bush and John McCain within the 2000s, a lot to Corridor’s disapproval. From the late Seventies on, he took an lively function in upstate New York politics, organizing for anti-nuclear energy and environmentally progressive insurance policies. He joined the legislature of Ulster County in 1989 and the Board of Training of Saugerties, New York, in 1991, later serving two phrases in Congress as a Democrat representing the state’s nineteenth District, from 2007 to 2011. Whereas in Washington, he continued to advocate for environmental causes and served on a subcommittee on power independence and local weather change. Corridor had put music on maintain whereas he held workplace, however in 2021 launched a solo album known as Reclaiming My Time — a nod to procedural language used within the Capitol.

A Motown icon who fronted Martha & the Vandellas, the lady group that gave us immortal hits together with “Nowhere to Run” and “Dancing within the Streets,” Martha Reeves greater than earned her spot on Rolling Stone’s listing of the 200 greatest singers of all time. She has the extra distinction of being elected to the town council of her hometown of Detroit, holding that place from 2005 to 2009. Her time period was not with out its travails, and her failed reelection bid included an embarrassing gaffe through which an error-filled campaign flier recognized her as a member of the NFL staff the Detroit Lions. However Reeves was sanguine about her time in authorities. “It was an training that I didn’t suppose I’d get wherever else,” she said as she left workplace, commemorating her departure by singing a set for family and friends. “I’m glad it’s over, however I don’t remorse it in any respect.”   

Few biographies could possibly be extra American than that of Jimmie Davis. Born on the flip of the twentieth century to poor Louisiana sharecroppers who couldn’t bear in mind his precise birthday, he launched into a rustic music profession within the Twenties, ultimately serving to to popularize the style far past its rural origins. He was additionally famend for his gospel singing. Davis’ 1940 landmark recording of “You Are My Sunshine,” whose authentic authorship is disputed, became a nationwide phenomenon and spawned tons of of covers; a long time later, it was named Louisiana’s official state track. Davis started climbing the political ladder within the late Thirties, first with a job as a security commissioner in Shreveport, then working for a state utilities regulator. He ran for governor as a Democrat in 1944, acting at marketing campaign rallies, and was often called “the singing governor” after taking his workplace, which he was identified to disregard in favor of alternatives in leisure, like the possibility to play himself in a 1947 Hollywood biopic known as Louisiana. This era is nonetheless remembered for plenty of progressive achievements in social welfare, training, and public well being, and Davis obtained the primary driver’s license within the state after signing the regulation that created the licensing system. He served a second time period as governor from 1960-1964, having received reelection after a protracted absence from workplace by pledging to uphold segregation insurance policies. As soon as again in authorities, he took measures to quash civil rights activism.

Like Mamdani, Beto O’Rourke made it to the nationwide political stage and shortly discovered his opponents making an attempt to assault him over his musical previous. The previous El Paso Metropolis metropolis council member and three-term consultant for Texas’ sixteenth District gave up his U.S. Home seat to mount a formidable 2018 problem to Sen. Ted Cruz. That summer time, the Texas GOP tweeted out the cover of The El Paso Pussycats, a 1993 EP that O’Rourke had recorded together with his previous post-harcore band Foss, taking part in bass (he was sporting his then-girlfriend’s floral costume within the picture). Meant as a jab concerning the candidate ducking debates with Cruz to play a gig as a substitute, the publish was broadly mocked and presumably did little to assist Cruz declare a slim victory in November (the rivals in the end had two debates, with Cruz skipping a 3rd, town-hall model occasion). In the meantime, O’Rourke was credited with serving to down-ballot allies win, and he set a file for many votes forged for a Democrat in Texas historical past. Most commentators felt, the truth is, that his punk days had been a credibility enhance for O’Rourke, who steadily talked concerning the DIY scene of El Paso within the early Nineties, the place he met Foss drummer and vocalist Cedric Bixler-Zavala, later well-known because the frontman of At the Drive-In and the Mars Volta. On the marketing campaign path in 2017, he told Rolling Stone that he had been into teams together with the Conflict, Minor Menace, and Rites of Spring, and admired the self-made D.C. label Dischord Information.            

Antonio Delgado represented New York’s nineteenth District within the U.S. Home of Representatives, leaving in the midst of his second time period to grow to be the state’s lieutenant governor, the place he at present holds. Earlier than getting into politics, Delgado was a rapper, spitting socially acutely aware verses about racial justice, the conflict in Iraq, the necessity for common well being care, and extra underneath the moniker AD the Voice. Republicans tried to make use of Delgado’s rap profession towards him when he was working to unseat incumbent Rep. John Faso in Congress, calling him a “huge metropolis rapper” in a single assault advert. It didn’t work. Delgado ousted Faso, received a second time period two years later, and is now serving New York in Albany.

Bruce Franks Jr. got here to prominence as a frontrunner and mediator in St. Louis-area protests that erupted within the months following the deadly capturing of Black 18-year-old Michael Brown by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014. A impassioned battle rapper underneath the title Ooops — his most memorable matchup was a 2015 showdown towards the California rapper Daylyt — he known as for felony justice reform and police accountability as a part of the ascendant Black Lives Matter motion, and was arrested at a number of rallies over the deaths of individuals of colour by the hands of regulation enforcement. Franks secured a seat within the Missouri Home of Representatives in 2016 after efficiently suing to overturn the outcomes of a Democratic major through which he had misplaced to the incumbent, arguing that absentee ballots had been miscounted, after which successful the court-ordered do-over major. Although his activism impressed many others, in addition to an Oscar-nominated brief documentary, St. Louis Superman, he resigned from workplace in 2019, citing psychological well being points. That very same yr, the Missouri Ethics Fee fined him greater than $14,000 for a wide range of marketing campaign finance violations. Final yr, Franks was charged with theft and forgery in Arizona for allegedly falsifying paperwork about his printing firm sending out 2022 election marketing campaign flyers that had been by no means really mailed. He entered a plea deal, pleading responsible to 1 cost of theft, and was positioned on supervised probation, with 9 different fees dismissed.     

A hardcore punk guitarist all through the Nineties and 2000s, Justin Brannan usually fused politics and music together with his collaborators within the bands Indecision and Most Treasured Blood. The latter, like Brannan, explicitly espoused beliefs of animal welfare, environmentalism, and social justice, interesting to the straight-edge set. Brannan labored a few jobs in finance — he was a wealth administration clerk on the ill-fated Bear Stearns when it went underneath in the course of the 2008 monetary disaster — earlier than touchdown a communications function underneath a New York Metropolis council member representing the forty seventh District, which encompasses neighborhoods together with Bay Ridge, the place he grew up and ultimately based a Democratic political membership. He took over that council seat in 2017, was reelected in 2021, and managed to maintain it after the district was redrawn for a 2024 election. His 2025 bid to grow to be New York Metropolis comptroller was unsuccessful, nevertheless. Regardless of his rise in municipal authorities, Brannan continues to be joyful to reminisce about his touring days, which made for many gritty, wild tales. “We might particularly ask the reserving brokers to ship us the place different bands didn’t wanna go,” he said of Most Treasured Blood in an interview with the hardcore web site No Echo in 2024. “Generally it was superior. Generally we obtained strip-searched.” 

Jerry Butler, who died at age 85 in February, obtained his begin because the lead vocalist for the R&B group the Impressions, becoming a member of the vocal ensemble within the late Fifties together with Curtis Mayfield after the 2 met singing in a Chicago church choir. He quickly went solo, nevertheless, with a string of memorable soul singles together with “Solely the Robust Survive” and “Let It Be Me.” A cool and composed stage presence nicknamed The Iceman, Butler would go on to be a commissioner for Cook dinner County, Illinois, from 1986 till his retirement 2018, incomes a grasp’s diploma in public administration in 1993. Butler was obsessed with increasing public entry to healthcare and instrumental within the opening of the John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook dinner County in 2002. After his demise, colleagues memorialized him as somebody who labored exhausting to enhance group assets and infrastructure. All through his greater than 30 years as a county commissioner, he continued to sing as Jerry “Iceman” Butler on the weekends.