100,000 chants for Taylor Swift
Montauk native Jake Epstein is attempting to say "Taylor Swift" 100,000 times outside Madison Square Garden Friday. Credit: Newsday/David Olson
Across the street from Madison Square Garden, self-described "mega-Swiftie" and Montauk native Jake Epstein is sitting in a blue canvas chair chanting "Taylor Swift" like a religious mantra. He is aiming to reach 100,000 chants.
"Taylor Swift, Taylor Swift, Taylor Swift," he says, as he presses his computer’s space bar to tally the chants. He had passed 16,500 by 10:30 a.m., nearly three hours after he arrived, and he hopes to finish by 6 p.m., when, reports say, the Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce wedding festivities will be well underway.
"I want people to feel the Taylor love, feel the Travis love," he says.
He’s broadcasting live on his YouTube channel, TheJakeEpstein.
The chant reminds Epstein, 22, a 2025 Hofstra University video and television graduate who lives in Manhattan, of being at a Taylor Swift concert. "It’s like people in any stadium in the world who say, 'Taylor, Taylor' right when she’s coming out for one of her shows," he says.
Across the street from Madison Square Garden, self-described “mega-Swiftie” and Montauk native Jake Epstein is sitting in a blue canvas chair chanting “Taylor Swift” like a religious mantra. He is aiming to reach 100,000 chants.
— Newsday (@Newsday) July 3, 2026
Video credit: David Olson pic.twitter.com/EyDLHRlGXT
WATCH: In 2024, Montauk native Jake Epstein interviewed Travis Kelce, asking him when he was going to give a ring to a "special someone." 💍
— Newsday (@Newsday) July 3, 2026
Video credit: Jake Epstein pic.twitter.com/0zpv24Dhol
Epstein displays a video of himself, his voice in the background, interviewing Kelce at a media event before the 2025 Super Bowl in New Orleans. He said it was for Hofstra’s radio station, WRHU. When he asked Kelce if he had "any plans on giving anyone special in your life a ring anytime soon," Kelce responded, "Next question."
Epstein said the massive interest in Swift’s wedding "just shows how much global impact she has and how much people love her." And to hold the wedding in Madison Square Garden on a Fourth of July weekend celebrating the nation’s 250th birthday makes it even more special, he said. "This is not just the Fourth of July," Epstein said. "It’s the Fourth of July on steroids."
David Olson covers health care. He has worked at Newsday since 2015 and previously covered immigration, multicultural issues and religion at The Press-Enterprise in Southern California.
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