Taylor Swift has finally shaken off a copyright lawsuit over song lyrics that her attorneys had called “absurd.”
A federal judge on Monday (July 6) dismissed an infringement case filed by Kimberly Marasco, a self-published Florida poet who claimed that the superstar stole lyrics from her poems for more than a dozen songs, spanning Lover, Folklore, Evermore, Midnights and The Tortured Poets Department.
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In her ruling, Judge Aileen Cannon said the only similarities between Marasco’s poems and Swift’s songs were generic words — including “basic ideas” like the concept of “gaslighting,” as well as “ubiquitous metaphors” and “common observations.”
“These are quintessential themes, concepts, and isolated words — exactly the kind of material copyright law does not protect,” the judge wrote in her decision, obtained and first reported by Billboard. “The allegedly infringed material — basic ideas, themes, metaphors, isolated words, and short phrases — is not protected expression and cannot be infringed.”
Federal judges often give accusers like Marasco a chance to fix and refile their cases. But in her ruling Monday, Judge Cannon refused to do so, citing the fact that Marasco had already seen previous lawsuits against Swift thrown out of court and had been “expressly warned” that it was her final chance.
“Plaintiff has had ample opportunity to plead her claims,” the judge wrote. “The defects identified are not pleading defects curable by more careful drafting — they are defects in the underlying works themselves, which consist of ideas, themes, metaphors, and isolated words that no amendment can transform into protectable expression.”
Barring a reversal on appeal — the odds of which are extremely low — Monday’s ruling should finally end Marasco’s litigation against Swift, which has dragged on for more than two years across two cases. She did not immediately return a request for comment. A rep for Swift declined to comment.
Marasco first sued Taylor’s company (Taylor Swift Productions) in 2024, claiming the star had lifted lyrics to “The Man,” “My Tears Ricochet,” “Illicit Affairs” and many other songs from earlier poems. Then early last year, Marasco filed another case against Swift herself, over largely the same allegations.
Swift’s legal team always strongly denied any wrongdoing, and the first case was dismissed in September. At the time, Judge Cannon ruled that Marasco didn’t own any rights to the “common” phrases she claimed Swift had copied.
In December, Swift’s lawyers pressed to end the entire dispute “once and for all,” arguing Marasco had “no conceivable case” against the superstar, particularly after her first lawsuit had already been dismissed.
“This is plaintiff’s second frivolous and harassing lawsuit against artist,” Swift’s longtime attorney, Douglas Baldridge, wrote at the time. “Plaintiff’s claims are, as in her last lawsuit, absurd and legally baseless.”
In Monday’s decision, Judge Cannon agreed. She repeatedly cited her earlier decision, ruling that Swift’s use of common words and phrases like “tears,” “running,” “fire,” “rain,” “sky,” “love,” “invisible,” “caged me,” “flesh and blood,” “it’s time to go” could not possibly amount to copyright infringement.
“As this court already explained in that related case, such content amount at most to ideas metaphors, contexts, and themes — none of which is a proper subject of copyright protection,” Cannon wrote.
The newer case included accusations about several new Taylor songs, including “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart” and “The Manuscript” from Tortured Poets. But the judge said those allegations would fare no better than the original claims.
“Each addition rests entirely on unprotectable content,” the judge writes, saying Marasco was trying to sue over things like “the theme of ‘creative resilience,’” and the “common observation” that leaves turn colors: “In sum, none of plaintiff’s 12 counts identifies any protected expression.”
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