Victor Willis, lead singer of the disco group Village Folks whose hit “Y.M.C.A.” grew to become a fixture at rallies for President Trump, has died, his spouse and the band mentioned in Fb posts on Wednesday. He was 74.
“It’s with profound unhappiness that I need to announce the loss of life of my husband, VICTOR WILLIS,” Karen-Huff Willis mentioned in a assertion on the musician’s Fb web page. “Victor handed away on Tuesday June 30, 2026 because of a brief, however aggressive sickness.”
The band shared the same assertion on its Fb web page.
The Texas-born musician was a co-founder of the Village Folks and co-wrote hits together with “Y.M.C.A,” “Within the Navy” and “Macho Man” that swept the world’s dancefloors within the late Seventies.
With their flamboyant costumes and choreography, the group grew to become a popular culture phenomenon, focusing on disco’s massive homosexual viewers with camp fantasy characters of butch builders, bikers, cowboys and troopers.
Willis left the group in 1980 however rejoined in 2017.
Photograph by Daniel Boczarski/Redferns/Getty 
He struggled with drug habit and took a plea deal over cocaine possession in 2006.
“I obtained very depressed through the years and determined to only drop off the map. So I obtained into medicine,” he advised the San Diego Union Tribune in 2015.
“Y.M.C.A.,” whose lyrics urge “younger males” to move to the Younger Males’s Christian Affiliation in New York, grew to become an anthem for the LGBTQ neighborhood and past.
However some say the music has been co-opted by the American proper wing motion following its use at rallies and occasions supporting Mr. Trump.
“I do not endorse Trump, I’ve by no means endorsed Trump, nor has the Village Folks,” Willis advised the BBC in 2020. “However due to the copyright legal guidelines in america, he is capable of play our music any time he desires to.”
The band carried out “Y.M.C.A.” at a Trump rally in January 2025, earlier than the Republican was inaugurated for his second time period as president.
“Let’s give President Trump an opportunity, no matter what you’ll have thought of him up to now,” Willis mentioned on the time. “Let’s have a look at what he’ll do transferring ahead, and if he does issues to limit LGBTQ rights, Village Folks would be the first to talk out.”
In 2012, when Willis was away from the group, a decide dominated the singer may reclaim a minimum of partial possession of the copyrights to greater than two dozen of the their songs, together with “Y.M.C.A.,” “Macho Man” and “Within the Navy.” The decision paved the best way for his return to the group in 2017, BBC Information reported.
