Ed Sheeran denies attending J.K. Rowling’s NYE party
He called reports saying he attended the party “divisive and damaging”
Ed Sheeran has called reports saying he attended a New Year’s Eve party hosted by J.K. Rowling “divisive and damaging”.
Rowling held a party at Killiechassie House in Perth and Kinross, Scotland, attended by members of U2 and The Pretenders as well as Daniel Craig.
The Sun reported that Sheeran was also in attendance, which led to trans activist India Willoughby questioning the decision owing to Rowling’s openly anti-trans stance.
Sheeran then responded on his Instagram Stories, denying the reports and writing: “Respectfully, India Willoughby, and any other journalist who has reported both these stories, neither are true. I spent New Years with my friends and family”.
In the same series of posts, Sheeran also disputed a story saying that he performed for wounded Israeli Defence Force soldiers at a gig in 2024.
He wrote: “The story about wounded soldiers at my show, was a charity that sourced tickets to my show in Cyprus last year, which was a large scale public concert. This kind of reporting is divisive and damaging, please research before you post things.”
Responding to Sheeran’s clarification, Willoughby then tweeted: “Hi @edsheeran- this is great to hear. I used the word ‘reportedly’ about JK Rowling’s NYE party, because it was widely reported by UK and international media at the time. I also reached out directly to you in the first wk [sic] of Jan via Twitter to ask if the story was correct – but no reply. Delighted to hear you didn’t go!”
Last year, Daniel Radcliffe spole out about J.K. Rowling‘s ongoing anti-transgender comments, saying that he is “really sad” the Harry Potter author has embraced that perspective.
“It makes me really sad, ultimately,” Radcliffe said. “I do look at the person that I met, the times that we met, and the books that she wrote, and the world that she created, and all of that is to me so deeply empathic.”