The White House responded to a rant by John Mellencamp after the geriatric rocker criticized President Donald J. Trump’s renaming of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.
During at least two concerts on the 74-year-old singer’s “Dancing Words Tour,” Mellencamp ranted about the name change during the performance of his iconic early-1980s anthem “Pink Houses,” a song with lyrics that reference the Gulf of Mexico.
In one video from a July 25 show in New Jersey, the Indiana rocker sang “Well, there’s people and more people, what do they know, know, know?, go to work in some high rise,, and vacation down at the Gulf of Mexico,” before pausing to interject his anti-Trump commentary.
(Video: YouTube)
“Wait a minute,” Mellencamp said as the band continued playing.
“The Gulf of Mexico? Is that right? It’s not the Gulf of America? What a stupid f**king idea,” he told the PNC Bank Arts Center crowd before resuming the song as normal.
In another video from a recent show, the aging performer also interjected his political take into the song.
“Wait a minute. Is it really still the Gulf of Mexico?” Mellencamp said. “They changed the name of it, but I’m not buying it… That’s just not right.”
The White House slapped down the septuagenarian singer.
“Nobody in their right mind cares what out-of-touch, woke Hollywood celebrities have to say,” said White House spokesperson Davis Ingle in a statement to media outlets.
Shortly after he took office, Trump signed a proclamation officially changing the name of the oceanic basin largely surrounded by U.S. southern states to the Gulf of America.
✈️MOMENTS AGO ON AF1: President Trump signed a Proclamation declaring February 9th “Gulf of America Day” while flying over the newly and appropriately named GULF OF AMERICA! 🇺🇸
📸: @dto_rok pic.twitter.com/BA1f5VF3ft
— Karoline Leavitt (@PressSec) February 9, 2025
“I took this action in part because, as stated in that Order, “[t]he area formerly known as the Gulf of Mexico has long been an integral asset to our once burgeoning Nation and has remained an indelible part of America,” Trump said in a February 6, 2025 statement.
Like fellow 80s rock and roll relic Bruce Springsteen, Mellencamp has a tendency to spoil concerts for fans who shell out their hard-earned dollars to engage in political rants, ruining the night for people who just want to enjoy the music. An experience that is especially insufferable if it intrudes on one of their all-time classics.
Iconic Rolling Stones front-man Mick Jagger recently put it best when asked about “The Boss” and his lecturing of fans in the middle of a show.
Mick Jagger Says It’s Not His Job to Lecture Rolling Stones’ Fans on Politics
NYT: “Bruce Springsteen clearly sees his job as engaging in a meaningful back and forth.”
MICK JAGGER: “My job in the live music world is for those people that come to have the best time … And you… pic.twitter.com/PmNaTgLjs7
— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) July 11, 2026
“My job in the live music world is for those people that come to have the best time they possibly can, for two hours or whatever it is, to forget all their problems and the problems of the world, and their mortgages and whatever,” Jagger said during a recent interview. “And they can have just the best time. It’s similar, going to a sports event, really… you’re not worrying about everything else. Those things are out of your mind.”
“So that’s my job, is to make them have the best time… And you don’t want to lecture them,” he added.
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