Photo Credit: Tingey Injury Law Firm
A federal judge has issued a preliminary injunction against the Trump campaign, forcing the campaign to pause the use of Isaac Hayes’ song “Hold On, I’m Coming” at future rallies and events.
The estate of Isaac Hayes sued the campaign and sought the emergency injunction to prevent the song’s use at Trump rallies and events — and now a preliminary block has been approved according to a decision viewed Tuesday (September 3rd) by Digital Music News.
The estate has argued that the Trump campaign does not have permission to use the song despite existing venue licenses with performance rights organization BMI. While the Trump campaign must stop using the song, the judge did not order the removal of videos featuring the previous use of the song.
“I do order Trump and his campaign to not use the song without proper license,” Judge Thomas Thrash Jr. opined in the ruling from the bench in a court in Atlanta. An attorney for Trump, Ronald Coleman, told members of the media that the campaign has no interest in furthering its complaints. “
The campaign has no interest in annoying or hurting anyone. And if the Hayes family feels it hurts or annoys them, that’s fine, we’re not going to force the issue.”
The song in question is the 1966 song “Hold On, I’m Coming” that was co-written by Isaac Hates and David Porter. The song was performed by Sam Moore and Dave Prater, professionally known as the duo Sam & Dave. Dave Prater died in 1988. The Hayes estate alleges the Trump campaign has not “obtained a valid public performance license” and are requesting “compensatory damages for the unauthorized use” of the song.
The Trump campaign used the song as ‘outro’ music at campaign events in 2020 and continued to use the song throughout the 2024 presidential campaign. But attorneys for the Republican National Committee allege that the Hayes estate is not the license holder for the song.
Regardless, the campaign claims to have the rights to publicly perform the song based on proper PRO licenses. On that point, the Hayes estate says that they specifically removed those rights with a BMI political exclusion, though that mechanism remains subject to debate and may not hold up under legal scrutiny.
“We are very grateful and happy for the decision by Judge Thrash,” Isaac Hayes III said after the hearing. “I want this to serve as an opportunity for other artists to come forward that don’t want their music used by Donald Trump or other political entities.”
More as this develops.
