Did Nicole Scherzinger Just Out Herself As a Trump Supporter?

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Imagine going back in time to 2005 and telling someone, “In 19 years, Nicole Scherzinger from the Pussycat Dolls will be earning rave reviews in Sunset Boulevard on Broadway, but she’ll dash her own Tony hopes by seemingly outing herself as a Donald Trump supporter in Russell Brand’s Instagram comments. Oh, by the way, Trump becomes president twice and it is a nightmare.” They would probably be like, “What is Instagram?”

On Thursday, shortly before the curtain went up at Sunset Boulevard, a screenshot of Scherzinger commenting on Brand’s Instagram started to go viral. In his post, which was shared the day after the election and captioned “God Bless America,” Brand is holding a MAGA-style hat that reads “MAKE JESUS FIRST AGAIN.” Scherzinger commented, “Where do I get this hat!!!?”

Now, Scherzinger is very religious. It’s possible she was reacting to the Jesus element more so than the MAGA of it all. In fact, she was just on The Late Show telling Stephen Colbert that every night as the show begins she says a special prayer given to her by her grandfather, an archbishop in the Russian Orthodox church. “Every time I go onstage, I do the sign of the cross for protection,” she told Colbert.

Scherzinger is so religious that in 2016 she told the Daily Mail that she almost didn’t take her role in the TV movie adaptation of Dirty Dancing because her character gets an abortion. “It was like a crazy thing because, my family, my Papa’s a Bishop and my family’s really hardcore against abortion,” she told the tabloid, adding, “I just want to, you know, encourage everybody to keep your babies.”

While she may just love the big guy upstairs, that doesn’t explain what she’s doing hanging out in Russell Brand’s comment section. Last year, the former comedian (now more of a right-wing spiritual huckster) was accused of sexual assault and rape by several women. He has denied the allegations, but the stories women told about him were detailed and harrowing. Brand is not really the guy you want to be palling around with on Instagram. To add insult to injury, someone also shared a screenshot in which she appeared to like an Instagram post from Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in which he’s praising Brand and Tucker Carlson.

On Friday, Scherzinger posted an apology, explaining that she “believed the posts I engaged with were about encouraging people to choose love and faith. When I commented on these posts,” she wrote, “I made the mistake of not realizing that they could be easily interpreted as being politically related and I apologize to anyone who has understandably reached that conclusion. Many presumptions are being drawn, which do not reflect who I am, what I stand for, or who I voted for.” Scherzinger emphasized that “many of the marginalized communities feeling hurt and concerned by the results of the presidential election are people I care about most,” adding, “I stand with them, as I always have, throughout my life and career.”

Any way you turn it, this is not a good look for Scherzinger. The only person coming out on top here is Audra McDonald, whose path to a seventh Tony just got a lot clearer.

This post has been updated.