Kanye West has sparked fresh controversy by claiming that George Floyd died from fentanyl and that a police officer’s knee “wasn’t even on his neck like that.”
Floyd, a Black man, was killed in an altercation with police in Minneapolis in May 2020, with a video showing Officer Derek Chauvin with his knee on his neck for almost nine minutes.
West made the claims in an appearance on the Drink Champs podcast on Saturday and made his comments while discussing Candace Owens’s documentary The Greatest Lie Ever Sold: George Floyd and the Rise of BLM.
“They hit him with the fentanyl, if you look the guys knee wasn’t even on his neck like that,” said West.
He then went on to compare George Floyd to fashion designer Virgil Abloh, who died from cancer last November. And he then attacked the “Jewish media” who he claimed he had been “blocked” by.
“Tell me could you even rally run this interview? Mav (Maverick Carter) didn’t even run my interview, they blocked me out, the Jewish media blocked me out. This s*** is lit, right? I am lit right, I am lit.
“I put $140m into JP Morgan and they treated me like s*** so if JP Morgan Chase is treating me like that how are they treating the rest of y’all, I am outraged, people want to calm it down, I didn’t break a law.”
Chauvin, a white police officer, was convicted of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in April 2021.
Earlier this year Chauvin pleaded guilty to violating Floyd’s civil rights in federal court and was sentenced to 21 years in prison.
West’s recent round of controversy started after he wore a “White Lives Matter” t-shirt at a Paris fashion show.
He then took to Instagram where he posted screenshots of messages in which he stated that rapper Diddy was being controlled by Jews.
After his account was locked he went to Twitter and posted that he was tired and when he woke up he would go “death con 3 On JEWISH PEOPLE”, which saw his account there also locked.
West then conducted an interview with right-wing host Tucker Carlson on Fox News.
Unaired footage was then leaked to Vice in which West made a string of antisemitic comments as well as bizarre conspiracy theories.
In one comment, West said that he preferred his children with Kim Kardashian to learn about Hanukkah rather than Kwanzaa because “at least it will come with some financial engineering.”
