Donald Trump's Son Eric Accuses Apple Of 'Shadow Banning' His Wife Lara's New Song: 'Hardly Viable'

Donald Trump‘s son, Eric Trump, on Friday leveled an accusation at Apple Inc. AAPL, claiming the tech giant is “shadow banning” his wife’s newly released song cover.

What Happened: Lara Trump, Eric’s wife, recently released a cover of Tom Petty‘s hit song, “I Won’t Back Down.” Eric alleges that Apple is intentionally suppressing the song’s popularity on its platform.

"Breaking: Apple appears to be viscously shadow banning Lara Trump's new song, which immediately upon release, was 31st on the iTunes charts. Lara's name, when typed in full, is hardly viable and can only be found below ‘Fake News II.' The song itself is unsearchable," he posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

“Shadow banning” refers to the deliberate suppression of online content by social media companies to limit its engagement.

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Lara Trump echoed the sentiment on X, questioning why her song does not appear in the search results. She wrote, “Hey, [Apple] — where is my song??? Why doesn't my song appear when you search "I Won't Back Down"???”

An email sent to Apple by Benzinga seeking comments didn’t elicit any response until the time of publishing this story.

Why It Matters: Benzinga verified claims made by the Trumps. When searched for on Apple Music, the song is notably absent from the results. It is only accessible when searching for Lara Trump’s full name.

This song was at the center of a controversy in 2020 when Petty’s estate issued a cease and desist letter to Trump’s campaign for unauthorized use of the song. The letter stated that Petty would not want his song used for a campaign associated with racism and discrimination.

Petty’s track “I Won’t Back Down” gained widespread popularity, peaking at the 12th position on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and significantly contributing to the multi-platinum status of his album.

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Photo by mark reinstein on Shutterstock