Pharrell Issues Cease-and-Desist to Donald Trump for Playing “Happy” at Rally

Pharrell wasn’t happy to hear that Donald Trump used his hit song “Happy” at a Midwest rally, hours after the shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh on Saturday. Pharrell’s attorney Howard King sent Trump a cease-and-desist, stressing that he wasn’t granted permission to use the track, and given recent tragic events, the choice of song should have been deemed inappropriate. 

“On the day of the mass murder of 11 human beings at the hands of a deranged ‘nationalist,’ you played his song ‘Happy’ to a crowd at a political event in Indiana,” King wrote in the letter, per The Hollywood Reporter. “There was nothing ‘happy’ about the tragedy inflicted upon our country on Saturday and no permission was granted for your use of this song for this purpose.” Pharrell maintains that he has not and will not grant Trump permission to use his music while King claims the use of “Happy” constitutes both copyright and trademark infringement. 

Back in August, Trump received a second cease-and-desist from Aerosmith after discovering that he used their song “Livin’ on the Edge” during a rally in West Virginia. In the letter sent through Steven Tyler’s attorney Dina LaPolt, the group claimed that The Donald’s use of the track violated the Lanham Act, a law that prohibits “any false designation or misleading description or representation of fact … likely to cause confusion … as to the affiliation, connection, or association of such person with another person.”