Kanye West’s controversial Drink Champs interview has been removed and N.O.R.E issued an apology to George Floyd’s family.
Ye has been trending for all the wrong reasons lately. His latest round of rants included some pretty insensitive comments about the cause of death in the murder of George Floyd. Kanye West was given a chance to share his misguided thoughts on the unfortunate death of Floyd on N.O.R.E.’s show, the popular Drink Champs podcast. The show has grown in stature and now has millions of listeners and viewers.
It was on a platform this big that he was able to put out his thoughts on why George Floyd died at the hands of police. According to Ye, Floyd died as a result of a drug overdose and other preexisting conditions like heart disease and not because Derek Chauvin pinned him down for upwards of 9 minutes. He seems to have gotten this theory from his controversial right-wing friend Candace Owens.
Following Kanye’s comments, attorney Lee Merritt announced that Floyd’s family might be considering a lawsuit against Ye over “false statements about the manner of his death.”
N.O.R.E. has at least realized the role he played in giving Kanye the platform and has apologized to the Floyd family during a call-in appearance on today’s (Oct. 17) Breakfast Club. He also gave the assurance that new measures were being put in place to have better editing n the future.
“I just wanna be honest, I support freedom of speech. I support anybody, you know, not being censored. But I do not support anybody being hurt. I did not realize that the George Floyd statements on my show was so hurtful,” he said.
According to the “Banned From TV” star, Kanye told his producer early that if they stopped filming while he was talking, he would walk out. Last week, the “Flashing Lights” rapper’s Instagram was restricted because of Antisemitic posts, which he also doubled down on while on the podcast.
N.O.R.E.also explained that he and his team were hoping to avoid a potential “Birdman moment.” Hip-Hop fans would remember that Birdman walked out of a Breakfast Club interview in 2016.
The “Oh No” rapper also said that he did try to pull Kanye back later in the interview but also admitted that by then, he was already in a nice place, and his warnings may have been ignored.
“I apologize to the George Floyd family. I apologize to anybody that was hurt by Kanye West’s comments,” he continued.
When asked why the team even went ahead with the interview considering all of Ye’s recent antisemitic comments, N.O.R.E. responded by explaining that he had dealt with Kanye in the past and that they usually have a very good rapport when it comes to one-on-one scenarios.
However, he was quick to add that he does not support any of Ye’s recent comments and that he definitely did not support the George Floyd comments.
“I don’t support the antisemitic [comments]. That’s all I have is Jewish friends, all I have is Black friends. That’s it,” he added.
Check out what he had to say below:
