{"id":317175,"date":"2026-06-23T19:30:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T19:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/317175\/"},"modified":"2026-06-23T19:30:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T19:30:11","slug":"one-persons-hero-is-another-persons-enemy-tampa-sports-authority-wont-block-ye-concert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/317175\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018One person\u2019s hero is another person\u2019s enemy\u2019: Tampa Sports Authority won\u2019t block Ye concert"},"content":{"rendered":"

With Ye\u2019s two Tampa concerts just days away, Tampa Sports Authority Chair Patrick Manteiga<\/a> says the shows will go on despite a mounting pressure campaign from elected officials, Jewish community advocates and residents urging the publicly supported venue to call off the performances.<\/p>\n

Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, is scheduled to perform<\/a> on June 26 and June 28 at Raymond James Stadium<\/a>. The shows have drawn opposition over his history of antisemitic remarks, including praise for Adolf Hitler, calling himself a Nazi and selling merchandise featuring swastikas.<\/p>\n

Ye has since\u00a0publicly apologized<\/a> for his antisemitic actions.<\/p>\n

U.S. Sen. Rick Scott<\/a> first\u00a0called for\u00a0canceling<\/a>\u00a0Ye\u2019s Tampa concerts<\/a> in a letter to the Tampa Sports Authority Board of Directors on June 4, and has started a Change.org petition<\/a> that has reached 8,700 verified signatures as of Tuesday afternoon.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Scott later appeared at the Florida Holocaust Museum alongside U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody<\/a>, St. Petersburg mayoral candidate Charlie Crist<\/a>, Jewish community leaders and other officials calling for Tampa officials to block the performances.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cKanye West\u2019s concerts in Tampa, scheduled for June 26th and 28th, should NOT take place in Raymond James Stadium \u2014 a venue supported with public funds. There\u2019s no place for antisemitism in Florida, especially at the expense of the taxpayer,\u201d the petition states.<\/p>\n

But Manteiga said Tuesday that this weekend\u2019s concerts will not be canceled, and explained that doing so could expose the Tampa Sports Authority (and potentially taxpayers) to costly litigation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He acknowledged the petition and calls from the community, but said thousands of fans have also \u201cvoted that they\u2019re OK with this with their wallet because they\u2019re going to write $200 checks or more to get a ticket for this event.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would be very expensive to the community to cancel this because, you know, I assume there would be lawsuits to follow up. You can\u2019t just cancel something because you don\u2019t like what somebody said a year ago; that doesn\u2019t really stand up to the obligations that public venues have in allowing people to use them,\u201d Manteiga said.<\/p>\n

The Tampa situation is not unique. Other Ye concerts are also facing pressure from government officials, including an upcoming show at the Alamodome<\/a> in San Antonio. Manteiga explained that even without a contract already in place, it is difficult for venues to deny any artist the right to book them based on concerns about their speech.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cTo not rent a venue that is public and that\u2019s rentable based on the viewpoints of people is discriminatory and against First Amendment rights. Therefore, generally, the issue with renting the stadium will be, \u2018Do you have the money to rent it? And do you have the capacity of filling up and selling seats for it?\u2019 Those are really the standards here,\u201d Manteiga said.<\/p>\n

Manteiga said the controversy reflects a broader challenge for public venues that host large events involving polarizing figures, and that things could quickly become dicey if officials try to referee anybody\u2019s speech.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know, one person\u2019s hero is another person\u2019s enemy. We\u2019ve had Donald Trump at the stadium; I\u2019m sure there are people who wouldn\u2019t want him at the stadium. Down the road, we have Chris Brown. There might be women\u2019s organizations who don\u2019t want him at the stadium. Currently, Donald Trump doesn\u2019t like Bruce Springsteen. Does that mean that (Gov. Ron) DeSantis says, \u2018Well, we really don\u2019t want Bruce Springsteen in Florida?\u2019 Manteiga said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just gets a little above my pay grade to try to restrict people\u2019s use based on their speech.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With Ye\u2019s two Tampa concerts just days away, Tampa Sports Authority Chair Patrick Manteiga says the shows will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":304584,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[58976,3853,131798,3347,63134,124412,11708,3856,135,137,136,11187,121361],"class_list":["post-317175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-alamodome","tag-ashley-moody","tag-change-org","tag-charlie-crist","tag-kanye-west","tag-patrick-manteiga","tag-raymond-james-stadium","tag-rick-scott","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news","tag-tampa-sports-authority","tag-ye"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=317175"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317175\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/304584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=317175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=317175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=317175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}