Ticket smugglers in Brazil are even threatening Taylor Swift fans with guns who try to buy tickets to the singer's concerts in his country.
The Brazilian Congress has proceeded to present a new bill, nicknamed the "Taylor Swift Law", which provides for an increase in penalties for ticket smuggling in the country.
Following Taylor Swift's recent announcement that her 'The Eras Tour' tour will make a stop in Brazil, the opening of tickets for her concerts in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro has been marked by desperate bids.
Taylor Swift fans in Brazil have reportedly received threats of violence from vigilantes as they waited in line to buy tickets to her upcoming 'The Eras Tour' concerts.
According to various local Brazilian media, the vigilantes repeatedly tried to enter the queue for the sale of tickets in both Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
Some fans reported being threatened with guns and metal bats. A 19-year-old fan named Rylie Nef told Joven Pan that he received verbal threats from a group of thugs, who informed him that they intended to "beat these sisters to death."
Other fans have claimed to have seen various stuntmen masquerading as elderly or disabled people in order to gain privileged access to the ticket queue.
Police were called several times to both locations but offered little help, according to O Globo. It did, however, reportedly put some astute people off the queue.
Ticket smuggling is already a crime in Brazil, but MP Simone Marquetto wants to toughen the penalties already in place.
According to the Brazilian Report, the "Taylor Swift Law" proposes to increase the maximum prison sentence for ticket smuggling from one year to four years and impose fines of up to 100 times the price the smugglers ask for the tickets.
This means that for Taylor Swift concerts, the fines could be as high as $125,500.
"The exploitation of the Brazilian population by so-called ticket smugglers at any paid event expected to have a large audience is well-known and notorious," the bill states.
"The activity of these shrewd ticket sellers deprives the less fortunate of the opportunity to attend the performance they desire and is a real crime against the public economy," it said.
The bill argues that there are many examples to show that the concerns expressed are justified.
“The most recent is the case of the sale of concert tickets of an international singer. Fans claim that bootleggers bought a large number of tickets, preventing other consumers from buying tickets,” it said.
Of course, this isn't the first time that ticket sales for Taylor Swift's 'The Eras Tour' have drawn political interference.
In January, U.S. Senators Amy Klobuchar and Mike Lee held a hearing on the ethics of Ticketmaster and its parent company, Live Nation, after mishandling ticket sales for "The Eras Tour."
Taylor Swift will perform a total of five concerts in Brazil in November – two concerts at Nilton Santos Olympic Stadium in Rio de Janeiro and two concerts at Allianz Parque in Sao Paulo.
