Report: J.P. Morgan Chase Cut Ties with Kanye West Before His Antisemitic Tweets

Kanye West on stage
Associated Press

A new report shows that J.P. Morgan Chase severed its ties with rapper Kanye West before he issued his antisemitic tweets.

On Wednesday, conservative activist Candace Owens, who wore a “White Lives Matter” shirt alongside Kanye at his Paris fashion show, claimed to have been given as given a notice from J.P. Morgan telling Kanye their intention to sever their relationship. The notice Candace shared did not have a date to indicate when it had been sent to Kanye West.

“Earlier today I learned that @kanyewest was officially kicked out of JP Morgan Chase bank. I was told there was no official reason given, but they sent this letter as well to confirm that he has until late November to find another place for the Yeezy empire to bank,” Owens tweeted. 

“We are sending this letter to confirm our recent discussion with [redacted] that J.P. Morgan Chase Bank has decided to end its banking relationship with Yeezy, LLC and its affiliated entities,” the purported notice said.

According to the Daily Mail, Kanye West had actually been informed in late September – before his “White Lives Matter” moment and his antisemitism – that J.P. Morgan would be severing ties with him. The letter sent after he gave an interview to CNBC in which he openly considered taking his business elsewhere.

“I’m moving my money over from JPMorgan over to Bank of America, possibly, because I go and move $140 million over to JPMorgan and [CEO] Jamie Dimon never calls me,” West said.

“I find out Jing Ulrich is one of the heads of the board at Adidas and one of the heads of the board at JPMorgan, and they already treat me a certain way at Adidas. It doesn’t matter how much money you move over there,” he added.

West’s statements appear to correspond with the letter saying that the company is confirming “our recent discussion with [associate’s name] that JP Morgan Chase Bank has decided to end its banking relationship with Yeezy, LLC, and its affiliated entities.”

As the report noted, West also ended his relationship with Gap and Adidas prior to J.P. Morgan Chase severing ties. Kanye West also told Bloomberg News in September that he was done with corporate America.

“It’s time for me to go it alone,” he said. “It’s fine. I made the companies money. The companies made me money. We created ideas that will change apparel forever. Like the round jacket, the foam runner, the slides that have changed the shoe industry. Now it’s time for Ye to make the new industry. No more companies standing in between me and the audience.”

Last weekend, West had been suspended from social media for issuing several anti-semitic tweets. As Breitbart News reported:

Billionaire musician and entrepreneur Kanye West was suspended from Twitter and Instagram this weekend after he made several antisemitic posts, including a warning that he intended to go to “death con [sic] 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE” in subsequent posts.

On Friday, West took to Instagram to post screenshots of messages he had exchanged with fellow hip-hop star Diddy, claiming: “Ima [sic] use you as an example to show the Jewish people that told you to call me that no one can threaten or influence me.” He was then restricted from posting to his Instagram account for violating the platform’s hateful language policy, and the site deleted his offending messages. Subsequently, the Jerusalem Post noted, he posted photos of himself on Twitter with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook owns Instagram) and taunted Zuckerberg, who also happens to be Jewish.

West then posted the offending tweet Saturday night, threatening Jews and claiming he cannot be antisemitic because “black people are actually Jew also” — a belief shared by the Black Hebrew Israelite movement, some of whose branches embrace racist and antisemitic ideologies.

Unaired footage also leaked from Kanye West’s interview with Tucker Carlson in which he appeared to support ideologies related to the Black Hebrew Israelites, which claims that black people are the real Jews.

“When I say Jew, I mean the 12 lost tribes of Judah, the blood of Christ, who the people known as the race Black really are,” the Grammy winner said. “This is who our people are. The blood of Christ. This, as a Christian, is my belief.”

COMMENTS

Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.