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Monday, November 9, 2026Nov 9

‘Empire’s’ Jussie Smollett gets political in new video

FILE - In this May 20, 2016 file photo, Jussie Smollett attends the "Empire" FYC Event in Los Angeles. On Wednesday, March 15, 2017, Smollett debuted a music video for "F.U.W.", a song about injustice which he wrote and performs, on his YouTube page. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP, File)
FILE - In this May 20, 2016 file photo, Jussie Smollett attends the "Empire" FYC Event in Los Angeles. On Wednesday, March 15, 2017, Smollett debuted a music video for "F.U.W.", a song about injustice which he wrote and performs, on his YouTube page. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP, File) FILE - In this May 20, 2016 file photo, Jussie Smollett attends the "Empire" FYC Event in Los Angeles. On Wednesday, March 15, 2017, Smollett debuted a music video for "F.U.W.", a song about injustice which he wrote and performs, on his YouTube page. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP, File)

NEW YORK (AP) – While TV star Jussie Smollett was in the recording studio working on his own music apart from “Empire,” set for release later this year, he couldn’t help but write a song about what’s going in the world, from injustice to President Donald Trump.

That’s when he penned “F.U.W,” short for “(expletive) up world,” around President’s Day and immediately directed a music video to bring his words to life. The clip will debut late Wednesday on his YouTube page.

The black-and-white video features men and woman of various ethnicities and highlights injustices, from human and LGBT rights to religious and racial prejudices. A woman wears a hijab in one scene, a boy wears a hoodie in another and four women put their fists up as they stand in front of the words, “My body, my rights.”

“This song is for the oppressed. That’s why I feel like people will connect with it because it is very broad, because oppression is so broad,” he said in an interview Tuesday with The Associated Press.

In another scene, a man in a wheelchair runs over a Donald Trump mask.