Taylor Swift Reportedly Causing Concerns For Chiefs Super Bowl Parade, Kansas City Mayor Hits Back
Kansas City is preparing for absolute chaos Wednesday for the Chiefs Super Bowl parade, and the major X-factor is Taylor Swift.
The Chiefs will have their parade today in celebration of Super Bowl LVIII, and all eyes are on whether the most famous singer in the world will attend to support her boyfriend Travis Kelce.
KCUR reported a million fans are expected to descend on the city, and you can reasonably expect that number to jump if Swift attends. Her fans are passionate and perhaps a bit over-the-top. That might be an issue with those tasked with keeping the situation under control.
Will Taylor Swift attend Chiefs Super Bowl parade?
"That's gonna be a whole second level of security issues that we have to deal with — the crowds and all that sort of thing. So we are more than ready. We have no concerns with our safety protocols and what we're doing to make sure that the route will be free of any issues," Kansas City manager Brian Platt told KCUR when talking about the situation.
KCUR reported that Platt "hinted that city officials may have already told Swift’s team that her presence at the parade may be too much for the city's security to handle on its own."
"I can't confirm or deny but we might have already told that to her team, just to keep everybody safe and make things a little bit easier for us," Plattt told the outlet.
Will Taylor Swift attend the Chiefs Super Bowl parade? (Photo by Michael Owens/Getty Images)
However, Kansas City mayor Quinton Lucas hit back at any speculation Swift was told to not attend the festivities.
"Not true at all. Just had a great chat with @kcpolice Chief Graves. We’re enchanted to welcome everyone to tomorrow’s parade and the women and men of our police department are prepared to keep all safe. We’ll have a great championship celebration for our Chiefs," Lucas tweeted Tuesday night.
Fans are waiting to see if Swift shows up to the parade.
Security is always tight for a situation like a Super Bowl parade. Nobody wants to take any unnecessary risks or leave anything to chance.
However, the dynamics certainly change when the most famous woman in the world might show up. That adds an extra layer that results in much tighter restrictions.
What might those restrictions look like for Swift? It's hard to say for sure, but I can tell you one thing for sure. The odds are near zero that her massive and highly-trained security detail lets her ride on top of a bus exposed to a million people who can throw stuff or do much worse. If Swift does show up, I'd expect her to be behind some kind of protective glass if the vehicle is open-air, or she might simply be in a bulletproof vehicle.
That's speculation on my part, but knowing a little bit about how these situations go, that's the bare minimum. Unlike a stadium where people go through security scanners, you can't scan a million people in a city.
We'll see how it all shakes out, but all eyes are now on whether or not Swift will make an appearance. Let me know your read on the situation at David.Hookstead@outkick.com.