While the premiere of Melania Trump’s documentary made headlines this month, another member of the First Family has been quietly seeking a different kind of spotlight. Former RNC co-chair Lara Trump was photographed on the set of a music video in Miami, collaborating with Egyptian star Mohamed Ramadan on a song titled “Sah-Sah.”
The footage, which was recorded in September but gained attention this weekend, shows the president’s daughter-in-law trading verses and dance moves with Ramadan, who has more than 31 million followers on Instagram and is set to become the first Egyptian artist to headline Madison Square Garden in May. The Daily Beast described the scene as “murder on the dance floor.” The track drops on January 23.
A brief history of Lara Trump’s music career
For those who haven’t been following along, “Sah-Sah” represents the latest chapter in a constantly criticized musical journey.
2023: The era of Tom Petty
It began with a cover of Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down” — a burdening choice, given that Petty’s family issued a cease and desist to the Trump campaign in 2020 from using the song at rallies. “Trump was in no way authorized to use this song to promote a campaign that is leaving too many Americans and their common sense behind,” the family wrote at the time. “Tom Petty would never want a song of his used in a hate campaign.”
Lara Trump’s cover debuted in the top 10 on Billboard’s Digital Song Sales chart. Listeners were less impressed. Someone called it “poorly tuned auto-tuned karaoke.” Another said they “couldn’t believe how bad it was” and that they were “prepared for the horror that she might have a wonderful voice”, but found it “embarrassingly terrible”.
At the 2024 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, Colin Jost addressed Trump directly, saying, “I recently released a cover of ‘I Won’t Back Down’. Hearing that, Tom Petty died again. I can’t believe I’m saying this to a Trump family member, but maybe I’m sticking to politics.”
2024: Firefighter salute
Trump was undeterred, and followed up with “Hero,” a piano-driven song honoring first responders. The music video showed Trump singing on a fire escape in an evening gown. Political strategist Rick Wilson described the singing as sounding like “a wild boar and a bag of rusty cans being thrown into an industrial wood chipper.”
The top comment on the official YouTube video read: “Lara Trump, thank you! I’ve been paralyzed for ten years and when I heard this song, I actually stood up and ran to the TV to turn it off. The doctors say I should consider you my hero!”
Other reactions included: “Every tone is a violation of the Geneva Convention,” and “My dogs were harsh until I turned up the volume to hear the sound. They stopped and howled.”
“If your ears are exposed to the obnoxious sounds of Lara Trump singing, you may be entitled to compensation,” political commentator Travis Akers said.
Jimmy Kimmel incident
In April 2024, Jimmy Kimmel sent a crew to a farmer’s market in Los Angeles to play Trump’s single “Anything Is Possible” for pedestrians, telling them it was a leaked Taylor Swift song from Section of tortured poets.
“Honestly, I don’t know who he is; he’s not very good,” one listener said. Another described it as “really robotic, almost like artificial intelligence.” When asked to sum up the song in three words, one woman said: “Try again.”
When they were told it was actually Lara Trump, they were overcome with relief. “This makes a lot more sense,” was the general consensus.
2025: International Axis
This year brought “No Days Off”, a collaboration with Moroccan-American rapper French Montana. Rolling Stone called it “a masterclass in blissful acoustic pop”, noting that “Crisco’s thick layer of autotune that seemingly smothers Trump’s vocals isn’t enough to diminish the quality of her ‘singing’ that I’m just talking to at the microphone.”
The collaboration sparked backlash against French Montana from his fans. “I think the Muslim ban has been forgotten because the almighty dollar is what matters most,” one wrote. Another: “You sure want to be canceled by the black community now, don’t you?”
Enter Muhammad Ramadan
Image source: @Mohamed_Ramadan
The pairing with Ramadan came about through Make Music Right, a conservative music initiative founded by Trump to promote “traditional values” in American music. Ramadan, who has dominated the charts in the Middle East for more than a decade, posted behind-the-scenes footage from the shoot in Miami, including clips of himself teaching Trump’s daughter Carolina his signature “tiger dance” moves.
Ramadan wrote on Instagram after their first meeting: “There is something great on the horizon, God willing.”
Trump has since secured a distribution deal through First Class Label Group’s partnership with Warner Music Group for the upcoming EP. She also hosts Fox News on the weekends and established her own music company, LT Music LLC, in April 2025.
It remains to be seen whether “Sah-Sah” will become a crossover hit or join “Hero” in the annals of widely mocked celebrity projects. What is certain is that no amount of critical reception – or comparisons to violations of the Geneva Convention – has been able to weaken her resolve.
She won’t back down.