Were you expecting Taylor Swift to turn up at last night’s MTV VMAs? I was not. But she was one of the last ones to walk the VMA red carpet, and she dashed inside to win one of the first awards of the evening. In total, Taylor picked up seven VMAs, including awards for Song of the Summer (nope), Video of the Year, Artist of the Year, Best Collab and Best Pop. VOTY, SOTS and Collab were all given to “Fortnight” featuring Post Malone, her first single from The Tortured Poets Department. Like… even if you want to give it VOTY, there is absolutely no way that “Fortnight” was the Song of the Summer. None.

Taylor wore this Westwood-coded Dior look, a black-and-yellow tartan with a mullet skirt and bustier. People Mag thought her look was “Reputation-coded,” because I guess Swifties are still waiting for Reputation (Taylor’s Version). Y’all have been talking about the snake album for the better part of two years. I hope y’all get it after all this time. Seeing Taylor try to pull off a harder-edge look is always amusing to me though – like, she still looks like a Disney princess, even with the boots and punk-lite ensemble.

Tay also made this VMA appearance not even 24 hours after she endorsed the Harris-Walz ticket. Taylor had been dominating headlines in the political world throughout the day Wednesday, and much of it was good news for her. In her Instagram post endorsement, Taylor included a link to vote.gov. The US GSA announced yesterday that Taylor’s post drove over 337,000 visitors to the site.

Last thing: While Travis Kelce did not attend the VMAs, Taylor did give a shout-out to, in her words, “my boyfriend.”

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.