Jennifer Lopez’s inauguration performance left out key verses — and truths about America

Did Jennifer Lopez really know what she was singing?

When she took the stage at Joe Biden’s inauguration to belt out Woody Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land, Lopez was singing the lyrics of a devout socialist, some say even a communist, who would be turning in his grave to see his song rendered as a patriotic song of hope.

Guthrie wrote his song as a protest against Irving Berlin’s sickly sweet God Bless America. Originally he wanted to call it God Blessed America — past tense.

To Woody, America had failed its people. His song was a question more than a statement of fact: is this land really your land?

Lopez — following the inauguration script of hope and unity — omitted Guthrie’s most telling verses:

In the shadow of the steeple I saw…