President Trump and the Democratic Socialists of America rarely find areas of agreement, but Dolly Parton is one of them.

After the country superstar’s death from cancer was announced on Tuesday, tributes poured in with equal force from the left and the right, including MAGA-aligned officials, progressive power brokers and partisans who fall somewhere in between.

Zohran Mamdani, the democratic socialist mayor of New York, called her an “irreplaceable champion of the working class.” The Republican Party of Tennessee, her home state, declared her a “treasure,” while Greg Abbott, the Republican governor of Texas, pronounced “God Bless Dolly.”

Stephen K. Bannon, a former close aide to Trump, dedicated a lengthy segment of his podcast to Parton. On MS NOW, Symone Sanders Townsend, a left-leaning commentator and former Democratic strategist, assessed her as an “icon” who had used her cultural cachet with conservatives to “advocate for everybody.”

“The World loves you,” the president said in a social media post, as he ordered American flags across the country lowered in her honor.

The widespread embrace of Parton, 80, was no fluke. Over decades in the entertainment industry, the singer worked to maintain a careful distance from partisan politics while championing social causes through her music and philanthropy.

In her songwriting, she produced paeans to working-class struggle that were drawn from her hardscrabble roots; “9 to 5” became an enduring union anthem. But on red carpets and other public stages, she would often dodge questions about current affairs and political parties, perfecting the art of the comedic pivot.

“My daddy was a Republican, my mama was a Democrat, and I’m a hypocrite!” she once joked in a television interview.

In an interview with The New York Times ahead of the 2016 presidential election, Parton again leaned on her humor: “I think no matter if it’s Hillary or Donald Trump, we’re gonna be plagued with PMS either way — presidential mood swings!”

At times, her stance rankled fans who did not want to have to wonder about such a central part of her identity. But after her death, the near universal outpouring of affection proved Parton’s savvy in a country with deep cultural divisions.

A shrewd entrepreneur who spun her music career into a business empire — including Dollywood, a beauty brand and dog apparel line — Parton was loath to offend anyone in her fan base.

“Of course, I have my opinion about everybody and everything,” she once told an interviewer, “but I learned a long time ago, keep your damn mouth shut if you want to stay in show business.”

Martha Ackmann, who wrote a biography of Parton, said she believed that the root of the singer’s approach to politics went far deeper than business. It seemed based on a desire to avoid casting judgment on anyone, she said, and informed by her Christian convictions.

“I think it came from a genuine place of wanting to be a model of acceptance, of inclusivity,” Ackmann said.

Parton drew a line in the sand between herself and her more politically outspoken co-stars in the movie “9 to 5,” in which she played a secretary battling a domineering male boss alongside Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin. Fonda had been known as a prominent activist against the Vietnam War, alienating a segment of the American audience, and during a press event for the movie, Parton said outright that she did not always agree with Fonda’s views.

When the three actresses reunited onstage at the Emmys in 2017, Fonda and Tomlin used the opportunity to criticize President Trump, who was months into his first term. Parton looked visibly uncomfortable before turning to what she likes to call a “boob joke.”

As part of the 2019 podcast series “Dolly Parton’s America,” which delved into the singer’s approach to politics, Parton repeated her credo that she was an entertainer, not a political commentator.

“I just knew that I wasn’t playing that game,” she said of the Emmys appearance, with a touch of exasperation.

“No matter what you say,” she went on, “it’s wrong.”

In the podcast, she suggested that some of her reticence came from being part of a politically divided family that, at that time, could not seem to get through a dinner without an argument. One of her nephews, Bryan Seaver, who announced her death on social media this week, referred to her particular brand of political neutrality as “Dollitics.”

On social issues, though, Parton would often not hold back. Asked in an interview about the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020, Parton did not hesitate to say “of course Black lives matter” while throwing in a characteristic zinger: “Do we think our little white asses are the only ones that matter? No!”

After her death, liberal fans praised her as an L.G.B.T.Q. advocate, and a clip recirculated from a segment with Larry King in which Parton did not mince words. “If you’re gay you’re gay, if you’re straight you’re straight, and you should be allowed to be how you are and who you are,” she said.

Often, she would let her money do much of the talking. She helped fund initiatives devoted to education, pediatric health care, disaster relief, hunger and childhood literacy. During the coronavirus pandemic, she donated $1 million to fund research efforts that led to the development of the Moderna vaccine.

Her support for L.G.B.T.Q. people and for widespread vaccinations during the pandemic (she sang a version of one of her best-known hits that replaced “Jolene” with “vaccine”) were perhaps the closest she got to the kind of backlash she generally tried to avoid.

Whether it was her feisty humor, her skillful deflections or something else entirely, the waves of criticism never became large enough to swallow her up.

Parton said she twice declined the Presidential Medal of Freedom during the first Trump administration, explaining that she could not attend the first time because her husband was ill and then because of the pandemic. At the start of President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s term, she said she would be hesitant to accept the award from him in case it appeared as though she were picking sides.

That did not stop politicians from claiming her as their own. In an interview with Glenn Beck on Wednesday, Trump gushed about Parton, while acknowledging that she was not a “very political person.”

But, he said, “she really liked me, I will tell you.”

Sheelagh McNeill contributed research.