President Donald Trump is once again facing a wave of criticism from the cultural world. He responded in the only way he knew how: by bullying. The president Trump launched harsh attacks against legendary musician Bruce Springsteen, pop icon Taylor Swift, and some of the biggest names in American cinema. In turn, artists have been outspoken against his administration, using some events like concerts and the Cannes Film Festival as a platform to denounce what they describe as authoritarian drift in the United States.

On his Truth Social platform, Trump lashed out at Bruce Springsteen, calling him “an arrogant, unpleasant dope,” adding that he never liked his music or his “radical left politics.” Trump described the 75-year-old musician as “a dried up rocker like a prune (his skin is all shriveled!)” and said he was “dumb as a rock.”

Springsteen, known as “The Boss,” had launched his European tour “Land of Hope and Dreams” by declaring that the U.S. was under a “corrupt, incompetent and traitorous administration.” Speaking at a concert in Manchester, he told the crowd: “My home, the America I love, the America I’ve written about and that has been a beacon of hope and freedom for 250 years, is in danger.”

Trump responded by writing: “This dried up rocker like a prune (his skin is all shriveled!) should KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT until he gets back to our country, that’s usually the way it works. Let’s see how he does then!”

The president also reignited his feud with Taylor Swift, posting: “Has anyone noticed that, since I said ‘I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT’, she’s no longer ‘hot’?” The comment likely refers to a previous post from September where he wrote: “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!” The 35-year-old singer, who supported Kamala Harris in the last election, is the world’s wealthiest musician with a personal fortune estimated at \$1.6 billion and winner of 14 Grammy Awards and 30 MTV Video Music Awards.

At the Cannes Film Festival, Trump’s name has become a central topic. Haitian-born, Oscar-nominated and Emmy-winning director Raoul Peck premiered his documentary Orwell: 2+2=5, a portrait of author George Orwell and a stark warning about the rise of authoritarianism. Peck told AFP: “All the signs are there, all the facts are there, where every section of society is attacked. I hope Americans will realise that they are already in an authoritarian regime.”

“Journalism is attacked. Justice is attacked. The truth is attacked. All the elements that build a democratic society are under attack,” he said, drawing parallels with Orwell’s 1984 and Animal Farm. “That’s how dictatorship implements itself in society. It terrorises,” Peck said.

“When you fear to voice your opinion at work, at school, in your everyday life, and God forbid, in public. What do you call that?” he asked.

Chilean-American actor Pedro Pascal, star of The Last of Us, also made headlines in Cannes. Speaking during the premiere of Eddington, a dark satire about U.S. politics directed by Ari Aster, Pascal declared: “It’s very scary for an actor participating in a movie to sort of speak to issues like this. I’m an immigrant. My parents are refugees from Chile. We fled a dictatorship, and I was privileged enough to grow up in the US after asylum in Denmark... I stand by those protections.”

“So keep telling the stories, keep expressing yourself and keep fighting to be who you are,” he told reporters. “Fuck the people that try to make you scared. And fight back.”

Trump’s recent proposal to impose 100-percent tariffs on films “produced in foreign lands” has further fueled the backlash. While actors Jon Voight and Sylvester Stallone expressed support for the idea of bringing productions back to the U.S., they urged the administration to consider tax incentives instead of tariffs. Many in the industry fear the proposal could be devastating.

“I don’t see any benefit to what he is trying to do. If anything it could really hurt us,” said Scott Jones of Artist View Entertainment. “A lot of people are out of work right now, and this is not going to make it better.”

A veteran producer who voted twice for Trump told AFP anonymously: “Investors, particularly foreign ones, don’t want to get burned down the line. He’s killing us.”

Louise Lantagne of Quebecreatif said: “Of course it is going to be hell if (tariffs) happen,” while others warned the legal framework would make such tariffs nearly impossible to implement.

Oscar-winner Sylvain Bellemare, sound editor of Arrival, said the lines are blurry. His recent projects include U.S. films shot entirely in Canada or South Africa. “Hollywood movies are made all over the world,” he said.

Robert De Niro, honored at Cannes with an honorary Palme d’Or, continued his vocal opposition to Trump. “They have big businesses, they have to worry about the wrath of Trump, and that’s where they have to make a decision: do I succumb to that or do I say no?” he told AFP. On stage, he called Trump “America’s philistine president” and warned: “You can’t have apathy, you can’t have silence. People have to speak up and they have to take chances and risk being harassed. You just can’t let the bully win, period.”

With information from AFP