Taylor Swift Says Feud with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian Felt Like ‘Career Death’: ‘I Went Down Really, Really Hard’

The pop superstar opened up about the fallout from the 2016 phone call surrounding the track “Famous” in TIME’s 2023 Person of the Year cover story

Taylor Swift is reflecting on how the feud between her and Kanye West and Kim Kardashian affected her mentally. 

The pop superstar, 33, is TIME’s 2023 Person of the Year and in the cover interview she spoke candidly about the 2016 incident in which the rapper, 46, dropped the song “Famous” featuring a vulgar lyric about her, which she denied approving, and his then-wife, 43, released an edited, recorded phone call between them that led fans to believe otherwise. 

She explained to the outlet that the moment and the public’s reaction felt like “a career death” and “took [her] down psychologically to a place [she’d] never been before.” 

“Make no mistake — my career was taken away from me,” the “Cruel Summer” singer said.