Taylor Swift's feud with Kim Kardashian has been reignited once again. Here's what you need to know.

• Taylor Swift fans think her new song "Thank You Aimee" is a thinly veiled jab at Kim Kardashian.
• Their feud dates back to 2016, when Kardashian's then-husband Kanye West insulted Swift in a song.
• Keep reading for the complete breakdown of the drama, which was also reignited in 2020.

Plenty of context is required to understand why Taylor Swift and Kim Kardashian are paired in new headlines this week — especially since, to the public's knowledge, they haven't interacted in years.

Swift released her new album "The Tortured Poets Department" last Friday. One of the deluxe tracks, "Thank You Aimee" (stylized as "thanK you aIMee"), seems to be a thinly veiled jab at Kardashian.

Their feud dates back to 2016, when Kardashian's then-husband Kanye West, now known as Ye, name-dropped Swift in his song "Famous."

Once the release led to a very public clash between the two musicians (who already had a strained relationship), Kardashian put herself in the crossfire to defend Ye. That decision sparked years of drama and several apparent allusions in Swift's music.

Here's a complete breakdown of everything you need to know to understand the never-ending feud.

It all started when Kardashian released clips of a phone call between Swift and Ye, without Swift's knowledge or permission

Back when Ye released "The Life of Pablo" in 2016, Swift's fans were furious that track four featured an insulting lyric: "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex / Why? I made that bitch famous."

The lyric references the 2009 VMAs, when Ye stormed the stage during Swift's acceptance speech for best female video to declare Beyoncé should've won instead. (Meanwhile, Beyoncé could be seen in the audience mouthing, "Kanye, no!")

Once the song "Famous" was released, Swift's publicist, Tree Paine, responded with a statement: "Kanye did not call for approval, but to ask Taylor to release his single 'Famous' on her Twitter account. She declined and cautioned him about releasing a song with such a strong misogynistic message. Taylor was never made aware of the actual lyric, 'I made that bitch famous.'" 

Ye refuted this statement with a lengthy thread on social media: "I called Taylor and had a hour long convo with her about the line and she thought it was funny and gave her blessings," he wrote in a now-deleted tweet. Ye added, "Bitch is an endearing term in hip hop."

Months later, after the duo exchanged many snide remarks in speeches and interviews, Kardashian posted short clips of that very "convo" on Snapchat. The three-minute compilation shows Ye in his studio talking to Swift on the phone, asking for her blessing to release the song.

Kardashian's footage shows the rapper reading Swift the original line, "I feel like Taylor Swift might owe me sex," which she approvingly described as "obviously very tongue-in-cheek."

Although none of the clips showed any reference to the "bitch" lyric, Swift's critics still reveled in the shade. The hashtag #KimExposedTaylorParty quickly began trending. People flooded Swift's social media pages with snake emojis, and Kardashian herself egged them on: "Wait it's legit National Snake Day?!?!? They have holidays for everybody, I mean everything these days!" she tweeted, adding 37 snake emojis.

Again, Swift released a statement that specifically condemned Ye's use of the misogynistic phrase.

"Where in the video of Kanye telling me he was going to call me 'that bitch' in his song? It doesn't exist because it never happened. You don't get to control someone's emotional response to being called 'that bitch' in front of the entire world," Swift wrote in a now-deleted post. "Of course I wanted to like the song. I wanted to believe Kanye when he told me that I would love the song."

Years later, Swift opened up about the incident during an interview with Rolling Stone, insisting that "the world didn't understand the context" of her outrage.

"Some events took place to cause me to be pissed off when he called me a bitch. That was not just a singular event," she told the magazine in 2019.

"I was so touched that he would be respectful and, like, tell me about this one line in the song," she said, referring to the "might still have sex" lyric. "And then when I heard the song, I was like, 'I'm done with this. If you want to be on bad terms, let's be on bad terms, but just be real about it.'"

Swift's 2017 album 'Reputation' was partially inspired by her feud with Ye and Kardashian

Following the #TaylorSwiftIsOverParty and weeks of public scrutiny, Swift withdrew from the public eye. She later compared that time in her life to being hit by a tidal wave.

"You can either stand there and let the wave crash into you, and you can try as hard as you can to fight something that's more powerful and bigger than you," she told The Guardian in 2019. "Or you can dive under the water, hold your breath, wait for it to pass and while you're down there, try to learn something."

She returned in 2017 with "Reputation." As the title suggests, the album unpacks Swift's public image in the wake of the "Famous" fiasco. 

Songs like "I Did Something Bad" and "This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things" seem to address the fallout directly, especially the latter, which was almost certainly inspired by Ye. Throughout this era, Swift adopted the snake as her personal sigil.

In 2020, a video of the complete phone call leaked online

Mysteriously, a 25-minute video of Ye speaking with Swift surfaced on YouTube, which appears to show their phone call in its entirety.

It's still unclear where the video came from and who released it, but it quickly began to circulate on social media and inspired the hashtag #KanyeWestIsOverParty.

The video paints a more comprehensive picture of the conversation, its content, and its tone — as opposed to Kardashian's compilation of clips, which only featured choice snippets of dialogue.

It's now clear that Ye never told Swift about the specific line in question, "I made that bitch famous." In fact, at one point, Swift tells Ye that she would feel uncomfortable if he called her a "bitch" in the song.

"I mean, I need to think about it, because you know, when you hear something for the first time, you just need to think about it," she tells him. "I'm glad it's not mean, though. It doesn't feel mean. But oh my god, the buildup you gave it, I thought it was going to be like, 'That stupid, dumb bitch.' But it's not."

Swift also seemed uncomfortable with Ye asking her to help him promote the song, and declined to release "Famous" through her own social media.

"I mean, the launch thing, I think it would be kind of confusing to people," she continues. "But I definitely like… I definitely think that when I'm asked about it, of course I'll be like, 'Yeah, I love that. I think it's hilarious.' But, um, I need to think about it."

Later in the call, Ye suggests that he might add the line, "I made her famous." Swift responds with a very apprehensive tone: "Well, what am I going to do about it?"

"I mean… Um… It's just kind of like, whatever, at this point," she continues. "But I mean, you've got to tell the story the way that it happened to you and the way that you've experienced it. Like, you honestly didn't know who I was before that. Like, it doesn't matter if I sold 7 million of that album ['Fearless'] before you did that, which is what happened. You didn't know who I was before that. It's fine. But, um, yeah. I can't wait to hear it."

The call ends with Swift asking Ye to send her the finished song, which she maintains never happened.

After the full video leaked, Swift and Kardashian reacted by liking fans' posts on social media

Two days after the leak, neither Swift nor Kardashian had made public statements about the new development. Instead, both women subtly revealed where they stood by liking fans' posts on social media.

Swift, who is very active on Tumblr and often interacts with fans on the site, has liked a slew of posts that show "Swifties" feeling vindicated.

"And that is how you let Karma take care of itself," one post reads, alongside a gif of Swift looking satisfied.

 "WHO WAS TELLING THE TRUTH THE ENTIRE TIME???" reads another, alongside a photo of Swift pointing at herself.

Swift also liked a BuzzFeed headline that argues, "Everyone Owes Taylor Swift An Apology," among others, including a fan-made "Taylor told the truth mood board."

For her part, Kardashian didn't appear to feel moved or incriminated by the full video.

The reality star liked a tweet that reads, "The video showed nothing new. We all knew that. I'm so confused right now."

A few days later, Swift broke her silence and reiterated that she was 'telling the truth the whole time'

Swift addressed the phone call in a statement posted to her Instagram story, which read as both a victory lap and an appeal to focus on "what really matters."

"Instead of answering those who are asking how I feel about the video footage that leaked, proving I was telling the truth the whole time about *that call* (you know, the one that was illegally recorded, that somebody edited and manipulated in order to frame me and put me, my family, and fans through hell for 4 years ) … SWIPE UP to see what really matters."

Swift's "swipe up" linked to a donation page for the Feeding America non-profit organization. 

"The World Health Organization and Feeding America are some of the organizations I've been donating to. If you have the ability to, please join me in donating during this crisis," Swift wrote in a second post on her Instagram story.

Kardashian maintained her then-husband's innocence in a string of tweets

Following Swift's Instagram story, Kardashian tagged Swift in a social media thread, writing that she'd "chosen to reignite an old exchange" that "feels very self-serving."

"I didn't feel the need to comment a few days ago, and I'm actually really embarrassed and mortified to be doing it right now, but because she continues to speak on it, I feel I'm left without a choice but to respond because she is actually lying," Kardashian continued.

"To be clear, the only issue I ever had around the situation was that Taylor lied through her publicist who stated that 'Kanye never called to ask for permission...' They clearly spoke so I let you all see that," Kardashian wrote. "Nobody ever denied the word 'bitch' was used without her permission."

Kardashian claimed the song hadn't been "fully written" when the two musicians spoke on the phone. She also accused Swift of "manipulating the truth of their actual conversation" with her publicist's original statement.

"The lie was never about the word bitch, It was always whether there was a call or not and the tone of the conversation," she wrote, adding: "I never edited the footage (another lie). I only posted a few clips on Snapchat to make my point and the full video that recently leaked doesn't change the narrative."

Once again, Swift's publicist shut down Kardashian's claims

Throughout the lengthy thread on X (then known as Twitter), Kardashian said her main issue was that Swift denied ever speaking to Ye on the phone — but Swift's original statement proves otherwise. 

Indeed, Swift's publicist responded to Kardashian by re-posting the exact statement she released to the media back in 2016.

"I'm Taylor's publicist and this is my UNEDITED original statement," Paine wrote. "Btw, when you take parts out, that's editing."

The second time around, it seemed like the internet sided with Swift

Amid all the back-and-forth, people continued to criticize Kardashian for cherry-picking clips of the conversation, choosing to leave out moments that would've painted Swift in a more sympathetic light.

"Did you not hear the discomfort in her voice?" one fan replied to Kardashian. "What tone are you referring to?"

"The thing that people don't seem to understand about this whole situation is that Taylor approved one line 'I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex.' But never approved and wasn't even told about the other line 'I made that b***h famous,'" another fan wrote.

Others simply mocked Kardashian for having a "one sided twitter breakdown," adding the hashtag, "Kanye West Is Over Party."

However, neither Kardashian nor Ye took any severe professional damage from this exchange — a double standard that Swift seems to reference in her 2024 song "Cassandra."

"When it's 'Burn the bitch,' they're shrieking / When the truth comes out, it's quiet," she sings. "So they filled my cell with snakes, I regret to say / Do you believe me now?"

In 2024, Swift's song Thank You Aimee' reignited interest in her fued with Kardashian

Swift is known for using her real life to fuel her art, so it's very possible that she's been inspired by Kardashian over the years.

The 2020 song "Mad Woman," for example, refers to a woman who does the cruel bidding of a wealthy man.

"Women like hunting witches too / Doing your dirtiest work for you," Swift sings in the second verse. "It's obvious that wanting me dead / Has really brought you two together."

The 2022 track "Vigilante Shit" also takes aim at Swift's enemies, including a mysterious man whose wife is leaving him. (Kardashian filed for divorce from Ye in 2021.) She lays out her motto in the song's chorus: "I don't start shit, but I can tell you how it ends / Don't get sad, get even."

Most recently, Swift included her least obscure reference to Kardashian in "Thank You Aimee," the 24th track on her new album "The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology."

The song title is stylized as "thanK you aIMee," so the capitalized letters spell "KIM." This sneaky strategy isn't unprecedented: Early in her career, Swift left coded messages for fans by capitalizing letters in her printed lyric booklets, indicating who or what may have inspired certain songs.

"Thank You Aimee" tells the story of a schoolyard bully, whose taunts and punches have continued to hurt Swift over the years.

"When I picture my hometown / There's a bronze, spray-tanned statue of you," Swift sings, possibly alluding to Kardashian's complexion. 

Swift also complains that "it wasn't a fair fight" and accuses her adversary of writing headlines in the newspaper, "laughing at each baby step I'd take."

While these details may not point to Kardashian directly, Swift makes it clear in the bridge that Aimee is a metaphor.

"Maybe you've reframed it / And in your mind, you never beat my spirit black and blue," she sings. "I don't think you've changed much / And so I changed your name and any real defining clues."

Another track on "The Anthology," titled "Cassandra," seems to reference Swift's "Reputation" era.