Ellen Pompeo Reveals How Taylor Swift Gave Her ‘Biggest Check’ for Children’s Charity ‘Without Blinking an Eye’

• Ellen Pompeo reminisced about being in the “Bad Blood” video 10 years ago
• The Grey’s Anatomy star then revealed she asked Taylor Swift for a donation to Children’s Hospital Los Angeles
• “She knew me all but 20 minutes and that girl wrote me the biggest check without blinking an eye,” Pompeo said

Ellen Pompeo is appreciative of Taylor Swift!

Appearing on the latest episode of The Jennifer Hudson Show, airing Wednesday, April 2, the actress, 55, opened up about how the pop star, 35, showed a huge amount of generosity towards an initiative that Pompeo was passionate about.

“Ten years ago you were in a Taylor Swift video?” host Jennifer Hudson first asked, to which Pompeo replied, “I was.”

“Actually, I forgot about Taylor, so that’s true, I do get a lot of points for that,” the Grey’s Anatomy star said of the cool points she gets from her children thanks to her cameo in the music video for Swift’s 2014 song “Bad Blood.”

“That got me so much mileage with both of the girls for a stretch,” Pompeo, who shares Stella, 15, Sienna, 10, and Eli, 8, with her music producer husband Chris Ivery, continued. “And Taylor is such a good girl and I didn’t know her and she invited me to be in the video and I thought, ‘Oh that would be fun.’ ”

The star, who was marking 20 years of Grey’s Anatomy on the show, continued, “I went and did the video, it was the easiest thing, like an hour or two.”

Pompeo then opened up about how Swift contributed towards a program at a children’s hospital where she and her husband, 57, volunteer.

“At the time, Chris and I, we do a lot of volunteering for Children’s Hospital Los Angeles here and they have an amazing program at Children’s where they make music for the babies in the NICU and for the parents who have to go to work all day and they can’t be with the kids.”  

“They record their voices singing nursery rhymes or telling them stories and they play it for the babies in the day when the parents can’t be there,” Pompeo continued. “The babies respond to it and it makes their outcomes more positive.”

The mother of three went on to say that the program needed money, “so I just got up the hooks and asked Taylor, ‘Could you write me a big old check for Children’s?’ and she knew me all but 20 minutes and that girl wrote me the biggest check without blinking an eye.”

Swift, who is known for her philanthropy, made multiple food bank donations during the U.K. leg of her Eras Tour last year, while the 14-time Grammy winner also donated to several organizations helping those affected by the Los Angeles wildfires earlier this year.

Rachel Biggs, the CEO of Cardiff Foodbank in Wales, “Taylor Swift’s generous donation to Cardiff Foodbank bought an incredible one and a half articulated lorries of food.”

“With this we supported over 925 people in need across Cardiff with a three-day emergency food parcel to make sure that people in crisis did not go hungry and offered a listening ear to support people to try and enable them to not need us again,” the CEO added. 

Swift performed at Cardiff’s Principality Stadium on June 18, 2024.