The Arena and Stadium license from ASCAP which I posted shows that the license covers all EVENTS at the arena or stadium. This includes expositions and exhibitions. See the first section of the license agreement for Arena and Stadium.
The music library covers the licensed songs in the list.... which is usually very lengthy. Venues will not plays songs not included in their license -- they do not want the legal trouble. In all of Trump's rally's the songs played were included in the venue's license.
Well, DOJ changed a bunch of things in 2019, so I don't know if that required them to add more clarity in their license agreements or not, but as I posted above this is current and it reads pretty cut and dry: First, while many venues have proper “public performance” licenses, as a general rule the ASCAP licenses for convention centers, arenas and hotels exclude music use during conventions, expositions and campaign events.
It should be noted that none of the campaigns of Democrats in 2016 or 2018 paid licensing fees for music in arenas or venues. None of the Republicans did either. Politicians only paid licensing fees for music that was placed in their media advertising. Are you suddenly claiming things changed in 2019 so 2020 will be different. That is going to piss off all the venues with written multi-year contracts in place -- that ASCAP unilaterally changed the rules.
That's a fair assumption to work under (if true) and will concede for argument's sake. My point was, now irrelevant if speaking strictly about arenas, that the campaign hasn't been shy about using music w/o permission in events, not limited to just arenas who may have license to play a song to perpetuity.
That's not true at all. The RNC bought licenses from ASCAP, BMI, and ESAC in 2016. I know that for a fact as folks I know were involved. The other thing you have to remember, if Trump holds an ad-hoc rally at a factory or an airport or something, they don't have those licenses. Thats why the Campaign needs a blanket license. And let me point out, if an artist really wanted to fight it, they could. There's the Lanham Act and there's The Right To Publicity or Personality Rights.
Updated: Queen Is The Champion Over Donald Trump And The RNC (Sort Of) Melinda NewmanFormer Contributor Media This article is more than 3 years old. (L) Donald Trump at the 2016 Republican National Convention, and Queen guitarist Brian May (R) at... [+] In the case of Queen vs. the RNC, it turns out that Queen can rightfully proclaim, “We are the champions.” Plus, we may see more changes coming forward that allow songwriters more control over how their music is used. After FORBES published this story last week about why Queen could not stop the RNC from playing “We Are The Champions” as Donald Trump appeared out of the fog, a number of other songwriters and artists, including The Rolling Stones, The O’Jays and Earth, Wind & Fire, vociferously objected via Twitter and Facebook about “unauthorized” use of their music at the RNC convention. The problem (for them) was that is was not, technically, unauthorized. The RNC had procured all the necessarily licenses from performing rights organizations ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC
• Even if the campaign does have a proper license to play your song at the campaign’s events, you may still be able to assert a legal claim that use of your name infringes your right of privacy/publicity; infringes or dilute trademark rights that you or your band may have in the band’s name or your name; or falsely implies that you have endorsed the candidate. Contact your agent or attorney about making these claims if the PRO says the campaign appears to have a proper license and you still want to shut down the campaign’s use of your song.