Following another successful Jay-Z organized Super Bowl halftime performance, conservative rock musician Kid Rock called the hip-hop mogul a “DEI hire.”
The “Cowboy” singer made that comment Feb. 9 on Fox News after his headlining Turning Point USA’s alternative Super Bowl halftime show.
According to Kid Rock, the NFL brought Jay-Z on to oversee the annual halftime show primarily to increase diversity in America’s most-watched sporting event, and the only reason Hova got the job is that he’s Black.
”Nothing against Jay-Z, I respect him for his hustle, you know, his music, but it seems like there’s a little bit of a DEI hire there going on,” Kid Rock told Laura Ingraham, in a clip shared online. “’Oh…Black guys love Jay-Z.’ And of course, I’m not that ignorant, I know a lot of us love Jay-Z, not just Black guys.”
He also aired broader complaints about the NFL’s choice.
“But in the league we have this problem, it seems like, oh, we’ll bring him in and so, you know, Jay-Z is not gonna take that position of power and that money, so then they convene, that was a not-for-profit league until they quietly got rid of that tax exempt status at some point, so [NFL commissioner] Roger [Goddell] didn’t have to disclose his salary,” Kid Rock said.
The “Bawitdaba” rocker joins a familiar chorus of conservative critics who have routinely taken issue with Jay-Z’s Super Bowl halftime show picks since he partnered with the NFL in 2013.
Those complaints hit a new peak months before Super Bowl LX, when Bad Bunny, a Spanish-speaking reggaeton star from the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, was announced as the halftime headliner.
In response, Turning Point USA, a right-wing activist group founded by the late Charlie Kirk, staged the “All-American Halftime Show,” a pre-taped event that also featured performances from Lee Brice, Brantley Gilbert, and Gabby Barrett.
According to YouTube viewer data, Turning Point USA’s alternative halftime show drew roughly 5 million concurrent viewers.
In comparison, Bad Bunny’s official halftime performance alongside Lady Gaga and Ricky Martin attracted a record-setting 135.4 million viewers. The turnout made it the most-watched Super Bowl halftime show behind only those performed by Kendrick Lamar and Michael Jackson.
So while Kid Rock may dismiss Jay-Z as a “DEI hire,” the Roc Nation founder’s track record of booking halftime headliners that deliver massive viewership speaks for itself—proving, as one of his own lyrics puts it, “men lie, women lie, but numbers don’t.”
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