Lara Trump, Republican National Committee Co-chair and daughter-in-law of , former U.S. President Donald Trump, reacts to the crowd on Oct. 4 in Fayetteville, North Carolina. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Getty Images

Lara Trump—daughter-in-law of the president-elect, Republican National Committee co-chair and potential U.S. Senator—has another side-hustle in the works: a music album. Trump has recorded an album’s worth of material, according to executive producer LJ Fino, who also worked with her on four tracks she already released, most notably her 2023 cover of Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down.”

“Lara has enjoyed working on music for over a year now and, in that time, has recorded several songs that have not been released,” says Fino, who also co-produced a chorus of Jan. 6 prisoners and Donald Trump’s rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” “When the time is right, she is excited to share them with the public.”

A spokesperson for Trump did not respond to an inquiry. Fino declined to elaborate on the unreleased tracks other than to confirm that a collaboration with Moroccan-born rapper French Montana was among them. “Lara had the song recorded already, and there was space to put a hip-hop artist or another artist on it,” Fino tells Forbes. “French heard the song, liked it, decided it was something he was willing to collaborate on.” Montana, whose 2017 single “Unforgettable” boasts 1.8 billion YouTube streams, posted a TikTok video in July that showed him in the studio with Trump. Montana’s publicist did not respond to an inquiry. (Montana was on the cover of the November issue of Forbes’ Morocco edition.)

The move comes on the heels of Lara Trump introducing a line of athletic wear (“it’s a celebration of strength, resilience and patriotism”) in November.

Trump’s musical release will be Fino’s latest attempt to reach an “America First” audience, which he thinks is worth more than $100 million. There are plenty of pro-Trump musicians (from Lil Wayne to Kid Rock) and an abundance of right-leaning country music fans, but Fino thinks there’s big money to be made music specifically targeting conservative listeners, especially beyond genres traditionally linked to that audience. “I’m looking behind me in my office and I have two Billboard plaques for Republican-angled rap records,” he says, referencing “Justice for All” and Loza Alexander’s “Let’s Go Brandon.”

In addition to streaming, Fino is hoping to tap into that market’s willingness to pay for downloads and vinyl. He’s also planning to launch artist-specific mobile apps designed to sell tickets, merchandise and VIP experiences. Previous tracks in a similar vein that Fino has released, which also includes Kari Lake and The Truth Bombers’ “81 Million Votes, My Ass” (a jab at President Joe Biden’s 2020 vote count), have appeared on Billboard’s digital sales charts.

Chris Schwartz’s RuffNation Entertainment will help Fino’s First Class Label Group with manufacturing and fulfillment of Lara Trump’s record. In the 1990s, Schwartz cofounded Ruffhouse Records, which propelled artists like The Fugees, Lauryn Hill and Cypress Hill into global icons. Schwartz says that physical media, now a larger segment of the business than it was in the 1990s, offers higher profit margins than streaming. Lara Trump’s appeal across the aisle and social media following make her an ideal artist for this approach, he claims.

“It could potentially be worth hundreds of millions of dollars,” Schwartz says of the market. “I’ve done it before,” he adds, referring to his past success in cultivating a lucrative market from a demographic overlooked by the mainstream music industry.

Most industry insiders Forbes spoke with acknowledged the market’s potential but expressed caution about the hundred million valuation.

“Realistically, there’s no way to estimate what this thing will be worth,” says Jeffrey Light, an attorney focused on the music business. Gross revenue for recorded music in the United States reached $17 billion in 2023, Light notes. “Do they think this is worth 1% of the whole U.S. market? I don’t know.”

“It’s clearly a big market,” says John Seay, an Atlanta-based entertainment attorney. “We are increasingly in a world where people seek out all sorts of media that validates their perspective and certain people become alienated with certain types of music and artists expressing their political views,” he adds. “Those people might want to turn to something specifically curated for them that validates their opinions. And there’s quite a few of them as the recent election showed.”

This cultural rift mirrors trends in other industries that have divided along ideological lines, including cable news, social-media platforms and even nicotine pouches. As Seay notes, Trump-branded Bibles are on sale for people who want to experience the word of God from a conservative.

One area where all four experts were skeptical, however, was the label’s plan to monetize downloads. Attorney Jeffrey Light points out that audiences aren’t paying to download songs (in fact, the redemption rate even for free downloads tends to run at less than 4%), although he acknowledged this market could be atypical. Peter Paterno, who founded the Walt Disney Company’s record label is more dismissive. “The stupid hillbilly still downloads,” he says, “but that’s not going to last.”

Focusing on physical sales, with their higher profit margins, though is considered a smarter play. “If they’ve tapped into this older audience who’s willing to download or buy a vinyl or whatever else,” says entertainment lawyer Wallace Collins, “that’s the old school record business where the markup was quite a bit better than the digital streaming world is.”

“If you have 10 million people and they’re paying 10 bucks each, you know, you’re almost there.”

More From Forbes

ForbesRNC Is Paying Trump Family Member Six FiguresBy Zach EversonForbesWhy Eric Trump Likely Isn’t As Rich As His SiblingsBy Kyle Khan-MullinsForbesHow Donald Trump Shifted Kids-Cancer Charity Money Into His BusinessBy Dan AlexanderForbesLara Trump And Michael Whatley Elected RNC Leaders As Trump Tightens Grip On RepublicansBy Molly BohannonForbesEric Trump Joins Family In Leaving New York, Declaring Florida His Official ResidenceBy Zach Everson