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While performing the song “Juno” on her recently wrapped Short ‘n Sweet tour, Sabrina Carpenter would “arrest” a fan or celebrity in the crowd in a fun moment involving pink prop handcuffs. The bit was a viral sensation during the outing that ended last month and it was accompanied by another viral favorite section where Carpenter would ask the crowd if they wanted to try out some “freaky positions,” before busting out a unique pose and saying “Have you ever tried… this one?”
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On Monday (Dec. 1), the White House once again appropriated a playful pop culture meme to shine a light on its attempt to deport undocumented people. In a 14-second TikTok video cued to “Juno,” a series of people are shown angrily filming ICE agents as they swoop in to arrest people on the street, with close-ups of handcuffs being slapped on someone. A series of clips of chases and arrests are then cued to Carpenter asking, “Have you ever tried this one?”
The caption to the clip reads “Have you ever tried this one? Bye-bye [kissy face emoji].”
At press time, a spokesperson for Carpenter had not returned Billboard‘s request for comment on the video; Billboard has also reached out to the White House to clarify if it got clearance from Carpenter to use her music in the ICE propaganda video.
The video dropped less than a month after Olivia Rodrigo lambasted the Trump administration after the Department of Homeland Security posted an Instagram video soundtracked by her Guts track “All-American Bitch” showing ICE officers forcibly tackling, detaining and deporting people. In the comments, Rodrigo wrote, “don’t ever use my songs to promote your racist, hateful propaganda.” The video featured a montage of what appeared to be undocumented people voluntarily boarding DHS flights and giving a thumbs-up as they depart. “LEAVE NOW and self-deport using the CPB Home app,” read the caption. “If you don’t, you will face consequences.”
Carpenter, a vocal supporter of Trump’s 2024 election rival Vice President Kamala Harris, is the latest artist to object to the president’s repeated use of popular music for his political videos without their permission. The pace of such seemingly unsanctioned usage has ramped up over the past few months, with Kenny Loggins lashing out at Trump for using his Top Gun classic “Danger Zone” under an AI-generated video of the president seemingly dumping a river of fecal matter on American citizens participating in the anti-Trump “No Kings” protests.
Swifties also aired their ire at the White House last month over a TikTok video set to Swift’s hit Billboard Hot 100 chart-topping single “The Fate of Ophelia,” renamed “The Fate of America,” depicting Trump’s mug shot from when he was charged with trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election results as well as an image of POTUS kissing an American flag. While Swift — an avowed Harris supporter who Trump has repeatedly said he “hates” — has not commented on the seemingly unauthorized appropriation of her music, the White House sent a response to Variety in which it gloated about owning the libs.
Representatives said they made the video specifically to get “fake news media brands” to “breathlessly amplify” their message. “Congrats, you got played,” the rep said.
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If you’ve ever wanted to get to know Lady Gaga better Stephen Colbert is here to help. On Monday night’s (Dec. 1) Late Show, Colbert revisited an interview he did with Mother Monster earlier this year at New York’s The Bitter End nightclub, during which she participated in his seriously silly Colbert Questionert interrogation.
The host hit her with an easy one early one: the best sandwich. Well, it wasn’t that easy. Gaga quickly answered Italian sub, but then busted out her impeccable French to give props to ham, butter and cheese on a baguette. “So an Italian sub, but in French,” Colbert clarified.
Then things started to get a bit more serious with a query about the first concert Gaga ever attended. Turns out it was a Jingle Ball show where the Goo Goo Dolls played amid a flurry of fake snow that broke her brain. “They had snow and I was losing my mind. It was my first experience with production in an arena. I was crying,” Gaga recalled.
According to Gaga, the scariest animal is any really large bird, like a big, scary hawk that might spirit you away to its nest and, if she had to choose between apples and oranges, she’d definitely go orange, seemingly to Colbert’s chagrin.
“You judged me,” she said in mock horror. I felt you go, ‘oh, New York, big apple!’” No, Colbert explained, it’s just that you can’t spread peanut butter on an orange, though Gaga did remind him that you can dip an orange in dark chocolate, which seemed to ease his mind.
To her recollection, Gaga said she’s never asked another famous person for their autograph, but when fans give her a piece of their art she does ask them to sign it.
And then came the big one, or as we like to call it the Keanu Question: what do you think happens when we die? “I’m not sure,” Gaga admitted with a heavy sigh. “I think we all vanish into each other. I say that on stage every night, but I think it’s just what I believe… Like I definitely believe that the soul is like kind of forever here in some way. That you go from being in one place to being everywhere.” Asked if she could sometimes sense those souls, Gaga said yes, that sometimes when people pass she thinks “‘they’re everywhere now.’”
Gaga said her favorite action movie is the 1993 Clint Eastwood political thriller In the Line of Fire, that she prefers a window seat for a feeling of safety and that her favorite smell is, awww, the scent of her fiancé Michael Polansky’s neck, noting that he doesn’t wear cologne and that bottled scents are her least favorite smell.
For a probing question about her earliest memory, Gaga got existential, asking for a clarification about whether it was her earliest memory in life. “Or before life if you can think that early,” Colbert shot back. Turns out the first thing Gaga can remember is getting really excited when her parents gave her a toy kitchen set. “I remember being really excited because I could play house,” she said.
As for what song Gaga would pick if she only had one tune to listen to for the rest of her life, Gaga chose John Lennon’s “Imagine,” explaining that she grew up very close to the Strawberry Fields Lennon memorial in New York’s Central Park. “That has a very special significance for me,” she said.
And finally, she described her life in five words: “It’s going to be great, hopefully.”
Gaga is preparing to wrap up her Mayhem Ball tour dates for the year with a pair of upcoming shows at Marvel Stadium in Melbourne, Australia on Friday (Dec. 5) and Saturday (Dec. 6).
Watch Gaga take the Colbert Questionert below.
Trending on Billboard Charlie Puth is standing strong in the face of online backlash to the announcement of his upcoming national anthem performance at next year’s Super Bowl LX (Feb. 8, 2026). “I’ll never claim to be as good of a singer as Whitney Houston ever was,” the four-time Grammy nominee wrote on X on […]
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Taylor Swift’s “The Fate of Ophelia” rebounds a spot to No. 1 on both the Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. charts, leading each list for a third total week. The song spent its first two weeks on each tally at the summit in October.
Three holiday hits catch a sleigh up the Global 200’s top 10, while two climb Global Excl. U.S., led by Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”
Plus, Stray Kids start at No. 8 on Global Excl. U.S. with “Do It.” The song is from their EP of the same name, which launches at No. 1 on the U.S.-based Billboard 200 albums chart.
Elsewhere, Olivia Dean adds her second Global Excl. U.S. top 10 with “So Easy (To Fall in Love)” (11-9).
The Billboard Global 200 and Global Excl. U.S. charts rank songs based on streaming and sales activity culled from more than 200 territories around the world, as compiled by Luminate. The Global 200 is inclusive of worldwide data and the Global Excl. U.S. chart comprises data from territories excluding the United States.
Chart ranks are based on a weighted formula incorporating official-only streams on both subscription and ad-supported tiers of audio and video music services, as well as download sales, the latter of which reflect purchases from full-service digital music retailers from around the world, with sales from direct-to-consumer (D2C) sites excluded from the charts’ calculations.
“The Fate of Ophelia” tops the Global 200 with 82.7 million streams (down 5% week-over-week) and 35,000 sold (up 199%) worldwide in the week ending Nov. 27. Helping spark its sales surge, its remix with the Chainsmokers was released digitally Nov. 25.
“Golden” by HUNTR/X (the singing trio of EJAE, Audrey Nuna and REI AMI), from Netflix’s KPop Demon Hunters, drops to No. 2 after 17 weeks atop the Global 200 beginning in July.
Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” jumps 6-3 on the Global 200 with 55.5 million streams (up 41%) and 3,000 sold (up 34%) worldwide. The carol has spent a record 19 weeks at No. 1.
Olivia Dean’s “Man I Need” slips to No. 4 from it No. 3 Global 200 best and Alex Warren’s “Ordinary” falls 4-5, following 10 weeks on top beginning in May.
Two holiday classics return to the Global 200’s top 10, with Wham’s “Last Christmas” up 12-6, with 50.8 million streams (up 43%) and 2,000 sold (up 50%) worldwide, and Brenda Lee’s “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” climbing 24-10, with 35.3 million streams (up 51%) and 1,000 sold (up 32%) globally. The songs have both hit No. 2 highs on the chart.
“The Fate of Ophelia” leads Global Excl. U.S. with 62.1 million streams (down 4%) and 10,000 sold (up 55%) beyond the U.S.
“Golden” backtracks to No. 2 after 17 weeks at No. 1 on Global Excl. U.S.; “Ordinary” rises 4-3 after eight weeks at No. 1 starting in May; and “Man I Need” retreats to No. 4 from its No. 3 high.
“All I Want for Christmas Is You” flies 14-5 on the Global 200 with 35.2 million streams (up 41%) and 2,000 sold (up 38%) outside the U.S. It has collected 14 weeks at No. 1.
“Last Christmas” leaps 20-7 on Global Excl. U.S. led by 32.5 million streams (up 45%) beyond the U.S. The song has reached No. 2 on the survey.
Stray Kids’ “Do It” bounds in at No. 8 on Global Excl. U.S. with 34.5 million streams and 3,000 sold outside the U.S. The group adds its fourth top 10 on the chart.
Plus, Dean’s “So Easy (To Fall in Love)” becomes her second Global Excl. U.S. top 10, ascending 11-9 with a 4% increase to 26.7 million streams outside the U.S.
The Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. charts (dated Dec. 6, 2025) will update on Billboard.com tomorrow, Dec. 2. For both charts, the top 100 titles are available to all readers on Billboard.com, while the complete 200-title rankings are visible on Billboard Pro, Billboard’s subscription-based service. For all chart news, you can follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.
Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.
Trending on Billboard Lorde is giving Justin Bieber his flowers on what she thinks was the song of the summer in 2025: “Daisies.” In a New Yorker piece published Monday (Dec. 1), the New Zealand pop star said that the Canadian singer’s Swag lead single was the “closest we came” to having a bonafide SOTS […]
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He may be 84, and his biggest hits are older — in some cases considerably — than the average user. But TikTok has a fan in Paul Anka.
That’s because his songbook, including “Put Your Head on My Shoulder,” “My Way” (for Frank Sinatra) and even “(You’re) Having My Baby,” are getting a new life on the app, soundtracking reels, gender reveals and more. Consequently, Anka has TikTok on his phone and iPad, and he and publisher Primary Wave keep tabs on the phenomenon — which is chronicled as part of the HBO documentary Paul Anka: His Way, premiering on Dec. 1.
“It’s somewhat amusing, in a sense, and gratifying,” Anka tells Billboard. “I just left Mexico City, 10,000 people (at a show) and I’ve got teenagers running around because of TikTok. No one in their vision years ago would say to you, ‘There’s gonna be TikTok.’ I would’ve told them they’re nuts. What is this? Why is this? How is this? Where did this come from? It’s unbelievable. But, because of TikTok, all these kids know these songs. That’s great.”
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Now Anka has several new projects — the documentary, a new album in 2026 and a jukebox musical — that will give his new fans, as well as longtime followers, a chance to immerse themselves in his life, and his way of doing things.
Acknowledging that “we’re doc-overwhelmed these days,” Anka says he’s been reticent about having his own documentary out. “People had come to me, and in meetings I felt like, ‘This doesn’t feel right. There’s not enough commitment. There’s not enough creative,’ blah, blah, blah,” he explains. But he connected with Paul Anka: His Way director John Maggio (Mr. Saturday Night) and his team — enough to greenlight the project and even cede a great deal of creative control over the project, which premiered at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival.
“I didn’t really want to have any credits as producer or anything like that,” Anka says. “My whole take was, ‘You guys know what you’re doing. I don’t want any talking heads. I don’t want 30 friends raving about me.’ I wasn’t into that. It was trusting in (Maggio and company) to follow me around and see what I’m about. The journey’s been culminating to this point to where the doc became something I wanted to do.”
Times of His Life
The story is, of course, epic. Anka came to New York from his native Ottawa when he was 15, hitting quickly with “Diana” in 1957. Part of corps of new pop heroes that included Pat Boone, Bobby Darin and Frankie Avalon, Anka established himself as a multi-threat singer (48 songs on the Billboard Hot 100, including 10 top 10s and two No. 1s) performer, actor and songwriter. As the lattermost, he penned hits for (or contributing to collaborations with) Sinatra, Buddy Holly (“It Doesn’t Matter Anymore”), Sammy Davis Jr. (“I’m Not Anyone”), Tom Jones (“She’s a Lady”), Barbra Streisand (“Jubilation”), Michael Jackson (“Love Never Felt So Good”) and Drake (“Don’t Matter to Me”).
Anka also famously wrote “Johnny’s Theme” for The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and talks in the documentary about having to give Carson credit and half of the publishing rights to have the song used over the objections of musical director Skitch Henderson. “I called it my college song,” Anka says. “It put my kids through college.”
It’s those songwriting achievements he wanted to be front and center of the documentary. “I was a writer; that was my gravitas,” Anka explains now. “As a kid I said, ‘I’m not gonna last in this business if I’m not the writer. I had that discussion with the Beatles when I met them; they weren’t writers yet, they were a cover band, and in Paris, when I met them, I said, ‘You gotta write! You gotta write!’
“The writing thing was what I was about, so I told the (documentary team), ‘Let’s educate them about what I’ve written. I wanted to put the emphasis on the creative side.’”
Paul Anka: His Way offers some look into his personal life (three marriages and six children, one of whom is married to Jason Bateman), but the film is free of some of the angsty tropes usually found in documentaries. “I was around all that sh-t — heroin, Frankie Lymon, a lot of others I won’t name — and you make a choice,” Anka explains. “You’re 15 years old and you come down from Canada with this great American dream you’re pursuing, you’re your success, and you don’t want to blow it. So I made a choice there were certain things I was going to do and I wasn’t gonna do. I’m still doing what I’m doing — I’m traveling, I’m performing, creating — because I take care of myself. I live a certain lifestyle. I eat a certain way. I don’t drink hard liquor. I’ve never been a smoker. I’m not tooting my own horn — just basic sh-t. If you want to be around and be coherent, you have to keep your sh-t together.”
Also of note in His Way is that despite Anka’s close relationships with the mob bosses who ran the music and entertainment industries he was working in, he never found himself in a kind of Four Seasons compromise situation.
“In my experience they were the best to work for — they were the only ones to work for,” Anka says. “But I never felt like anyone was moving in on me or strong-arming me or anything like that. I respected them. They respected me. I made money for them. I was told to keep my nose clean. They were gentlemen. I knew all those characters, yeah, but to think anyone who was in it and associated with them was in some way owned, absolutely not.”
Til The Mornin’ Comes
With the documentary coming out, Anka is now turning his attention to the musical, an autobiographical jukebox piece he’s also been reticent to tackle until recently. “I didn’t have a good vibe about the writers we were doing with before,” he says. “It’s tough terra firma, Broadway. I’ve always stayed away from it ’cause it’s dangerous. I’ve seen my friends get knocked out for two years to do it and then they’re dead in a day. I didn’t want to take the time, and we didn’t find the right group of people.”
He’s since partnered with producers out of Canada and brought in Rupert Holmes (The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Curtains) to write the book. “I like what he’s done,” Anka says. “I’ve seen a cross-section of his work and he’s very knowledgeable, very smart. I think he’s going to deliver something great.”
The musical is now “in process,” according to Anka, who expects to take up to two years to have something on the boards. “We’ll probably break it in Toronto,” he predicts. “It’s a gamble in a sense that, as I said earlier, Broadway ain’t that easy, so it’s iffy. But it feels like the right time in my life to do this.”
Coming sooner, on Feb. 13, will be Inspirations of Life and Love, Anka’s first album since 2021, for Green Hill Music and the Sun Label group. Part of a Primary Wave series of the same name, the 11-track set (with four bonus tracks for a deluxe edition) blends new versions of standards such as “It Was a Very Good Year,” “That’s Life” and “Let Me Try Again” along with brand new material penned by Anka and performed by the Budapest Scoring Orchestra with arrangements by Bill Ross, Carlos Rodgarman and others.
“It’s just a bunch of songs that are hopefully inspirational and about love, that simple,” says Anka, who’s stated to appear Dec. 1 on ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live. “There’s not a lot of uptempo stuff; we wanted to keep it very rich and ballady and emotional, kind of that message. Like, for instance, the Sinatra ‘That’s Life’ is uptempo, a lot of drive and everything, and we turned into more of an inspirational ballad style approach, which I’ve never heard before. I like doing something that’s never been heard before.”
Of his continuing creative drive, Anka notes — as he does in the documentary — that, “I haven’t put my flag on my mountain yet, even at my age. I’ve got the energy to do it. I don’t care what it sells or if I get critically acclaimed. We’ve sold a lot of records. The great challenge for me now is to do something that’s different and I’m really proud of. The rest is living gratefully and balancing your life.”
Trending on Billboard Rihanna has Anti on the brain this week, as the album — which remains her most recent full-length a decade after its release — has just clocked a historic 500th week on the Billboard 200. On the chart dated Dec. 6, 2025, the critically acclaimed LP ranks at No. 134, recording a […]
Trending on Billboard Christmas is in full swing on the Hot 100 with Wham!’s “Last Christmas,” Brenda Lee and more entering the top 10, but will any of these Christmas classics sweep the No. 1 spot? Tetris Kelly: This is the Billboard Hot 100 top 10 for the week, dated December 6th. “Opalite” falls down […]
Taylor Swift’s “The Fate of Ophelia” rules the Billboard Hot 100 for an eighth week, tying “Anti-Hero” as her longest-leading hit. “The Fate of Ophelia” has been No. 1 in each of its weeks on the Hot 100 so far, dating to its mid-October debut; “Anti-Hero” began its reign upon its arrival in November 2022. […]
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Ariana Grande‘s physical appearance has been dissected by the public numerous times over the years, but amid the rollout for the Wicked movies, the speculation has arguably reached a fever pitch — leading the performer to speak out about the issue once again.
In a post on Instagram Stories over the weekend, Grande posted a clip from a 2024 interview in which she discusses the dangers of openly criticizing people’s bodies in today’s society. “resharing this from last year,” she wrote Saturday (Nov. 29). “as a loving reminder to all.”
In the interview with French journalist Sally, the R.E.M. Beauty founder discusses how her body has been the subject of public discourse since she first rose to fame as a teenager. “I have heard it all. I’ve heard every version of it, of what’s wrong with me,” Grande said at the time. “And then you fix it, and then it’s wrong for different reasons.”
“It’s something that is uncomfortable no matter what scale you’re experiencing it on,” she continued in the December 2024 conversation as Cynthia Erivo sat next to her. “In today’s society, there’s a comfortability that we shouldn’t have at all commenting on other’s looks, appearance, what they think is going on behind the scenes, or health … I think it’s dangerous for all parties involved.”
The two-time Grammy winner’s post comes amid mounting concern for Grande’s health, with people online increasingly picking apart photos and videos — including shots of the star in Wicked: For Good, which premiered in November — of her, with many pointing out that she looks thinner than she used to. Others have speculated that the star is unhealthily slender — something she’s also addressed in the past.
“There are many different ways to look healthy and beautiful,” she said in a 2023 TikTok. “I know personally for me, the body that you’ve been comparing my current body to was the unhealthiest version of my body. I was on a lot of anti-depressants and drinking on them and eating poorly, and at the lowest point of my life when I looked the way you consider my ‘healthy.’ But that, in fact, wasn’t my healthy.”
“I think we should be gentler and less comfortable commenting on people’s bodies — no matter what,” she added at the time. “If you think you’re saying something good or well-intentioned, whatever it is. Healthy, unhealthy, big, small, this, that, sexy, not sexy … We just shouldn’t. We should really work towards not doing that as much.”
