Report: Adidas set to sever ties with Kanye West after series of antisemitic tirades

German sportswear giant Adidas is reportedly set to end its partnership with controversial American rapper Kanye West after his recent tirade of antisemitic comments that has seen him dropped by other major multinational brands, a report said Tuesday.

In an October 6 statement, Adidas announced that its relationship with the rapper was “under review,” triggering a social media campaign to pressure the sportswear brand to drop West.

Bloomberg news, citing people familiar with the matter, reported that Adidas could make an official announcement on severing ties as soon as Tuesday, after what it said were weeks of deliberations within the company.

Adidas’s partnership with West, who now goes by Ye, brought the company a reported $2 billion in revenue last year, accounting for 10 percent of its total profit. In the wake of the controversy, Adidas shares have fallen to their lowest price since April 2016.

Luxury fashion brand Balenciaga announced last Thursday that it had severed ties with West without citing a reason. Fashion brand Gap also cut ties with West.

An already completed documentary focusing on West, produced by MRC studio, was also nixed, with the company saying “we cannot support any content that amplifies his platform.”

West’s talent agency, CAA, also dropped the rapper last week.

Others in Hollywood, including West’s estranged wife, Kim Kardashian, and other members of her family, have also issued statements condemning antisemitism.

Antisemitic demonstrators on a Los Angeles overpass last week unfurled a banner praising the rapper, drawing condemnation from the White House.

West has been embroiled in controversy ever since Balenciaga’s Paris Fashion Week show earlier this month, during which he debuted a line of “White Lives Matter” shirts. The controversial slogan has been described by the Anti-Defamation League, an antisemitism watchdog and civil rights group, as a “white supremacist phrase.”

Since then, the rapper and fashion mogul has unleashed a spate of antisemitism across social media and in news interviews, including vowing to go “death con 3 on Jewish people” and claiming that he is the target of a “Jewish underground media mafia.” He was locked out of several social media accounts as a result of his posts.

West also accused Donald Trump’s Jewish son-in-law, Jared Kushner, of brokering the 2020 Abraham Accords “to make money,” invoking antisemitic stereotypes of Jewish financial greed.

In an interview with British journalist Piers Morgan that aired last week, West defended his remarks, but said he was sorry that they caused pain to some.

“I’m sorry for the people that I hurt with the confusion that I caused. I feel like I caused hurt and confusion and I’m sorry for the families of the people that have nothing to do with the trauma that I had been through,” he said.

Adidas’s relationship with West stretches back nearly a decade. In a letter last week to the CEO and board chair of Adidas, ADL head Jonathan Greenblatt pushed the company to end it.

Days before Greenblatt’s letter, West appeared on the popular podcast “Drink Champs” and bragged that he could maintain his Adidas partnership no matter how many antisemitic things he said.

“The thing about it being Adidas is like, I can literally say antisemitic shit and they cannot drop me,” he said. “Now what?” (The podcast has since removed its latest episode with West, and host N.O.R.E. has apologized for posting the interview.)

The sportswear company was founded in Germany by members of the Nazi Party and turned its shoe factories into Nazi munitions factories during WWII, but had also outfitted legendary Black US runner Jesse Owens at the 1936 Olympic Games held in Nazi Germany, and Allied goodwill for this connection helped Adidas enter the US market after the war. Adidas’s own company history glosses over its pre-1949 era.

Tobias Segal contributed to this report.