Nicki Minaj is making it clear that she meant exactly what she said, and how she said it.
The rapper is doubling down after using a homophobic slur to attack journalist Don Lemon, admitting she did so intentionally to provoke outrage and guarantee media coverage. Rather than walking back the comment, Minaj said the backlash was the point.
“LOL!!! And I purposely wrote it that way b/c I knew that would be the only way to get the c–k suckas to post about it,” Minaj wrote on X on Monday, Jan. 19, again pairing her message with an image of the horror character Chucky raising a middle finger. “They would’ve all collectively ignored the despicable behavior displayed by Lemon head. I’m glad they’re angry. They’re about to get angrier.”
The comments came hours after Minaj referred to Lemon as “DON ‘C—K SUCKIN’ LEMON” in an all-caps post criticizing the former CNN anchor’s livestream from Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota. The service had been interrupted by demonstrators protesting the presence of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents at the church.
In the same post, Minaj wrote, “HOW DARE YOU? I WANT THAT THUG IN JAIL!!!!! HE WOULD NEVER DO THAT TO ANY OTHER RELIGION. LOCK HIM UP!!!!!”
As previously reported by theGrio, the pastor listed on the Cities Church website, David Easterwood, is also identified as the acting director of ICE’s Saint Paul field office. Lemon’s livestream followed heightened tensions in the Twin Cities amid a surge in ICE activity during the Trump administration, including the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old American citizen and mother of three. ICE officer Jonathan Ross shot Good three times at point-blank range on Jan. 7 as she appeared to be driving away from an enforcement action.
Lemon, who is openly gay and married to real estate agent Tim Malone, responded to Minaj’s remarks, saying, “I’m not surprised Nicki Minaj does not understand journalism and is weighing in on matters that are above her capacity.”
“Nicki Minaj: Get a life. Stop being a Pick Me,” he added in a statement posted on his Instagram. “You should’ve put a Pick Me doll on that damn tweet instead of a Chucky doll because you are nothing but a Pick Me. And I choose not to pick you, and so should Black people. And gay people shouldn’t buy your music. Clock that.”
The clash is the latest in a string of controversies surrounding Minaj, who has increasingly aligned herself with right-wing figures and rhetoric. In December, she appeared onstage at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest in Phoenix alongside Erika Kirk, the widow of late right-wing activist Charlie Kirk, where she praised Donald Trump and JD Vance as “role models” for young men.
That appearance sparked swift backlash. Weeks later, more than 50,000 people signed a Change.org petition calling for Minaj’s deportation to Trinidad, where she was born. Minaj moved to the U.S. at age five and said during a 2024 livestream that she is still not a U.S. citizen.
