Green Day lead a chant against U.S. president-elect Donald Trump during their American Music Awards performance on Sunday (20Nov16).
The American Idiot rockers took to the stage at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles to perform Bang Bang, their lead single off new album Revolution Radio and in the middle of the song they began a chant which repeated the words, “No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA!”
The extra line is thought to be a reference to Trump’s endorsement by the white supremacy group the Klu Klux Klan and the rise in attacks against minority groups since his election victory on 8 November (16).
This isn’t the first time the group have taken aim at Trump in public. At the Europe Music Awards earlier this month (Nov16) they tweaked the lyrics to their 2004 hit American Idiot and sang, “Can you hear the sounds of hysteria?… The subliminal Trump America” instead of the original words: “The subliminal mind f**k America.”
In an interview with Britain’s NME magazine ahead of the election, lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong said he believed Trump had manipulated “uneducated white working-class people” into voting for him even though they have no real idea what they’re voting for.
“There’s this white nationalism that’s been brewing under the radar for a long time. But now (Trump’s) been able to cause people to lash out and blame minorities and it’s really confusing. I mean, blatant misogyny going on at the same time,” he said.
Following the shock result, Billie Joe told the BBC he felt sympathy for those in minority groups and supported the protests that took place across the USA against his election as president.