This week's presidential campaign news cycle went into overtime beginning with lingering conspiracy theories surrounding Super Bowl LVIII and its Taylor Swift connection. Remarkably, 32% of Republicans responding to a Monmouth University poll released Wednesday said they believed there is a covert government effort for Taylor Swift to help Joe Biden win reelection.

“The supposed Taylor Swift PsyOp conspiracy has legs among a decent number of Trump supporters. Even many who hadn’t heard about it before we polled them accept the idea as credible. Welcome to the 2024 election,” said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute.

While that was among the oddest trending campaign related news stories of the week, the release of the Hurd Report's double-edged slam job exonerating Biden as innocent of any crimes in his classified documents probe continued to linger, especially the White House's attempts at spin control.

But the week ended on other legal notes, including:

• A trial date set for March 25 for Trump's "hush money" civil fraud trial in New York City.