Redeem now - More details of Kanye West's conduct during his partnership with Adidas were revealed by The New York Times.
- The rapper drew a swastika on a shoe design and told a Jewish employee to kiss a photo of Hitler, per the Times.
- Adidas eventually cut ties with Ye in October 2022 after he made offensive and antisemitic comments.
At one of Kanye West's first meetings with Adidas he drew a swastika on a design sketch and told a Jewish member of staff to kiss a photo of Hitler, according to an investigation by The New York Times.
This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now. Have an account? Log in.For more than a decade, the rapper now known as Ye had one of the most lucrative celebrity-fashion partnerships ever with Adidas, generating sales of more than $1 billion a year.
But the German sportswear brand eventually cut ties with Ye in October 2022 after a series of public antisemitic tirades and offensive posts that caused him to be blocked from his social media accounts.
The New York Times looked more closely into Ye's behavior that Adidas tolerated during the partnership by speaking to current and former employees of Adidas and Ye, and examining hundreds of previously undisclosed documents. The report concluded that the Yeezy partnership had been "fraught from the start."
At their first meeting, the report said that Ye was unhappy with the shoe designs and fabric samples presented. He drew a swastika on one of them to express his displeasure, according to two unnamed participants who spoke to the Times.
Adidas is based in Germany, where most depictions of Nazi symbols are illegal and considered highly offensive.
In another detail of his troubling antisemitic behaviour, Ye told one Jewish manager at the company to kiss a picture of Hitler every day.
The investigation concluded that the profits generated from sales of Yeezy merchandise let Adidas executives to tolerate Ye's erratic and offensive behavior.
Although Ye has been less outspoken this year, he faced fresh allegations of antisemitism from former colleagues over the summer. Most recently, Ye's lawyers filed to secure the trademark rights for the use of the term "YEWS" across a range of sectors.
Adidas CEO Bjørn Gulden has defended Ye, saying that the rapper had been misunderstood.
"I don't think he meant what he said, and I don't think he's a bad person. It just came across that way," he told the "In Good Company" podcast.
After initially planning to burn its remaining Yeezy stock, Adidas instead decided to sell the sneakers and use the profits to make "substantial donations" to causes combatting antisemitism and other forms of racism. The company has not specified what proportion of the profits will be donated.
Adidas did not immediately reply to a request for comment from Insider, made outside normal working hours.
The company told the Times it had "no tolerance for hate speech and offensive behavior, which is why the company terminated the Adidas Yeezy partnership."
Representatives for Ye did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider. Ye did not respond to multiple requests for comment from The New York Times.
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