Ticketmaster cancels general ticket sale for Taylor Swift tour after 'extraordinarily high demands'

Saying goodbye to the chance of getting Taylor Swift tickets is "Death By A Thousand Cuts" for some fans – Ticketmaster announced Thursday it had canceled a scheduled general public ticket sale for the pop star's upcoming Eras tour.

"Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow's public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled," the official Ticketmaster Twitter account posted.

Ticketmaster's presale was supposed to be open to 1.5 million verified fans, but 14 million users – including bots – hit the site, Live Nation Chairman Greg Maffei said in a Thursday interview with CNBC. The site sold 2 million tickets on Tuesday, he added.

"I and all the LiveNation team is sympathetic to all the long wait times and fans who couldn't get what they wanted," Maffei added. "Reality is: It's a function of the massive demand that Taylor Swift has. … We could have filled 900 stadiums."

USA TODAY has reached out to Swift's representative for comment.

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The announcement follows several days of turbulence for fans hoping to score tickets to the U.S. leg of the Eras tour, which is scheduled for 52 shows in 20 cities from March to August 2023. Tuesday morning's verified fan presale, which only allowed in a select number of fans who registered in advance and received a presale code from Ticketmaster, saw major delays, errors and pauses in the queues to purchase tickets. As a result, the Capital One cardholders presale, which was scheduled to open that afternoon, was rescheduled to Wednesday.

The announcement isn't sitting well with Swift fans who were not selected for the verified fan presale and had planned to buy their tickets via the general sale. Tickets on third-party sites were on sale Thursday for as much as $28,000.

"that’s so unfair for everyone who didn’t get presale," one Twitter user replied to the Ticketmaster announcement.

"isn’t it so funny i sat in queue for taylor swift tickets for 6 hours and got nothing? but it’s fine, mistakes happen, i’ll try again tomorrow during general sale. oh but guess what! ticketmaster has decided to cancel general sale," another posted.

"What a complete dumpster fire," another wrote.

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The ticket sale ordeal has even garnered attention from politicians. Sen. Amy Klobuchar expressed "serious concerns about the state of competition in the ticketing industry and its harmful impact on consumers," and Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti said he is launching an anti-trust probe after consumer complaints related to the presale.

"Daily reminder that Ticketmaster is a monopoly, it’s merger with LiveNation should never have been approved, and they need to be reigned in. Break them up," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted Tuesday.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Taylor Swift: Ticketmaster axes tour public sale after 'high demands'