Many Kanye West fans were surprised by the rapper’s recent antisemitic remarks; however, Van Lathan says he knew it was coming.
“I’ve already heard him say that stuff before,” Van Lathan said during the latest episode of his Higher Learning podcast.
The former TMZ staffer famously challenged the DONDA hitmaker over his “slavery was a choice” comments during his viral visit to the outlet in 2018. Van Lathan recalled the encounter, revealing he mentioned the Holocaust while rebutting Ye’s slavery comments. Kanye allegedly said he “loved Hitler and the Nazis,” in response, but TMZ edited out that portion of the conversation.
“I mean, I was taken aback because that type of anti-Semitic talk is disgusting,” he told his co-host, Rachel Lindsay. “But as far as him, I knew that that was in him because when came to TMZ, he said that stuff and they took it out of the interview.”
“If you look at what I said at TMZ, it goes from me saying like, ‘Hey Kanye, there’s real-life, real-world implication to everything that you just said there.’ What I say after that — if I can remember, it’s been a long time — was, ’12 million people actually died because of Nazism and Hitler and all of that stuff,’ and then I move on to talk about what he said about slavery.”
‘I love Hitler, I love Nazis.’ Something to that effect.”
He continued: “The reason they took it out is because it wouldn’t have made sense unless they kept in Kanye saying he loved Hitler and the Nazis, which he said when he was at TMZ. He said something like, ‘I love Hitler, I love Nazis.’ Something to that effect.”
Because of this experience, Van Lathan wasn’t at all shocked to see Kanye’s recent social media posts. “When I saw this, I was like, ‘Oh, I knew that this was eventually coming.’ As a matter of fact, I had anticipated it coming,” he said, before adding, “like, way earlier than this.” Watch the episode at the end of the page.
Kanye West had his Twitter and Instagram accounts restricted earlier this week over antisemitic posts. Additionally, parts of Ye’s recent Fox News interview with Tucker Carlson were also left on the cutting room floor due to more antisemitism.
However, unedited footage leaked with Kanye making outlandish claims and suggesting conspiracy theories. LeBron James’s The Shop scrapped their entire interview with the rapper turned fashion designer. According to LeBron’s co-host, the rapper continued to “reiterate more hate speech and extremely dangerous stereotypes.”
Van Lathan On Kanye West
