Nicki Minaj discusses her relationship with Cardi B, drama surrounding “MotorSport” collaboration

Nicki Minaj just dropped a pair of tracks, “Barbie Tingz” and “Chun-Li”, and already controversy is stirring. It all stems from an early leaked version of “Chun-Li” which features the cut lines, “I ain’t never played a hoe position/ I ain’t never had to strip to get the pole position/ You’re in no position to come for O’s position.” People instantly saw this as Nicki throwing shade at Cardi B for disrespect surrounding their Migos collaboration “MotorSport”.

To recap, both Minaj and Cardi appeared on the Culture II track, but when Minaj was absent in behind-the-scenes footage and didn’t appear with the others in the video, fans smelled a beef burning. People extrapolated that she was pissed Cardi was on the track in the first place. However, Minaj said she never had a problem with Cardi’s appearance and a scheduling conflict with her hairdresser kept her from getting to the set with the other MCs.

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Now, in a new interview with Zane Lowe on Beats 1, Minaj has spoken more on the drama. She first stated that “Chun-Li” couldn’t have been about Cardi because it was written over a year and a half ago, originally for Drake’s last album (presumably Views or More Life). She actually gave a shout out to Cardi and “all the new female rappers who’ve been doing their things,” naming Ms Banks, Kash Doll, and Maliibu Miitch. “With Cardi B, she’s done exactly what she should’ve done. She’s gone full-steam ahead and congratulations to her.”

However, she went on to say that the first interview Cardi gave after “MotorSport” didn’t sit right with her. In the discussion with Capital XTRA, Cardi said she’d never heard Nicki’s final “MotorSport” verse. “I remember when I first came in the game, if a female of that status did a feature with me on it, I would only be singing their praises and saying thank you,” Minaj told Lowe. “The first interview she did after ‘MotorSport’ came out, it just hurt me because she looked so aggravated and angry. She just kept saying she didn’t hear it…. I was like, What?”

As Minaj recalls it, she begged Quavo to let her feature on “MotorSport” instead of “She For Keeps” after hearing a version with just him on the track. He eventually agreed, but told her all of Migos and Cardi B would also appear. Minaj had no issue with that, and the only thing that kept her from the video set was that hair conflict. (She even noted Cardi B now uses the same hairdresser, who could vouch for her.)

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When the drama started perculating, Minaj said she felt “ambushed” and reached out to Migos’ Quavo to help clear the air. According to her, Quavo texted back, “‘I would go on Twitter and back you up if you were my girl. Lol.’ And that hurt, because I love him.” In essence, she believes Migos and Cardi refused to step up for her because of the “Nicki hate” bandwagon. “It hurt my feelings to know that people would watch me be slaughtered and not one person will step in to say the truth. They’ll allow people to run with that lie because it’s entertaining to make Nicki seem like a bad guy. And it’s sad.”

She continued,

“And when it was time to clear the air about that, no one did that. All of them allowed me to look like I lied… And you still did interviews and ya’ll still jumped around that just to paint Nicki as the bad person so that you could play the victim. And that really, really hurt me because I really fully supported her. And up until this recent interview that she did [with Ebro Darden for Beats 1], I had never seen her show me genuine love in an interview. And I can just imagine how many girls wished they could’ve been on a song with Nicki Minaj.”

Minaj actually sounds a bit choked up when she says all this, as you can hear in the interview below.