It's Truly Shocking That It Took President Trump This Long to Get Into a Hip-Hop Feud
Since he's become President of the United States, Donald Trump has gotten in feuds with action/reality star Arnold Schwarzenegger, NBA owner/television personality Mark Cuban, and luxury department store Nordstrom. Though in the past he's gotten angry with rapper Mac Miller and Tony-winning hip-hop musical Hamilton, it has taken a total of 54 days for the leader of the free world to get into a proper rap beef.
This week, Snoop Dogg released the video for "Lavender," in which he pulls a gun filled with confetti on a Trump lookalike in clown makeup. Shortly afterward, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, and Trump's lawyer all condemned the video. Then, this morning at 5 A.M., the President of the United States woke up and sent the following tweet at Snoop Dogg:
Can you imagine what the outcry would be if @SnoopDogg, failing career and all, had aimed and fired the gun at President Obama? Jail time!
- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 15, 2017
In the above tweet, Donald Trump-who's never been one to convey clear ideas about anything-seems to imply that had Snoop Dogg pointed a gun at an effigy of Obama while he was in office, the former president would have had the rapper put in jail.
Satire and parody are, of course, protected by the First Amendment. As the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press notes, "Satire and parody are important forms of political commentary that rely on blurring the line between truth and outrageousness to attack, scorn, and ridicule public figures. Although they may be offensive and intentionally injurious, these statements contain constitutionally protected ideas and opinions, provided a reasonable reader would not mistake the statements as describing actual facts."
While Snoop has not yet responded to Trump's tweet, he told Billboard on Sunday:
When I be putting shit out, I don't ever expect or look for a reaction. I just put it out because I feel like it's something that's missing. Any time I drop something, I'm trying to fill in a void. I feel like it's a lot of people making cool records, having fun, partying, but nobody's dealing with the real issue with this fucking clown as president, and the shit that we dealing with out here, so I wanted to take time out to push pause on a party record and make one of these records for the time being.
Considering Donald Trump's thin skin and incomplete grasp of the First Amendment, it's surprising this hasn't happened sooner. In early February, Big Sean rapped that "I might just kill ISIS with the same icepick / That I murder Donald Trump in the same night with." And Eminem simply called the president a "bitch." In November of last year, Rick Ross rapped on "Free Enterprise," "Assassinate Trump like I'm Zimmerman / Now accept these words as they came from Eminem / Democratic party sentenced to the pendulum / Killing them, I voted for Andre Benjamin."
Maybe we can expect President Trump to drop a diss track? Or maybe he'll enlist Kellyanne Conway-she loves to perform, after all.
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