{"id":678511,"date":"2026-06-01T20:47:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T20:47:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/678511\/"},"modified":"2026-06-01T20:47:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T20:47:10","slug":"m-i-a-sues-kid-cudi-after-being-dropped-from-tour-says-she-was-fired-for-publicity-amid-poor-ticket-sales","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/678511\/","title":{"rendered":"M.I.A. sues Kid Cudi after being dropped from tour, says she was fired for \u2018publicity\u2019 amid poor ticket sales"},"content":{"rendered":"

British rapper M.I.A. filed a multi-million-dollar lawsuit last week against Kid Cudi, accusing him of dropping her from his tour \u201cto generate publicity\u201d for shows that\u2019ve \u201cstruggled with ticket sales.\u201d <\/p>\n

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Kid Cudi, whose legal name is Scott Mescudi, announced after a show in Dallas last month that the \u201cPaper Planes\u201d rapper would no longer appear on the \u201cRebel Ragers\u201d tour <\/a>because of her \u201coffensive remarks that\u201d had upset fans.<\/p>\n

But in a federal lawsuit filed in Los Angeles on Friday, M.I.A. \u2014 whose legal name is Mathangi Arulpragasam \u2014 said Kid Cudi had disingenuously \u201cportrayed himself as an aggrieved headliner forced to protect his fans from an out-of-control support act.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHere is the truth. M.I.A. was terminated to generate publicity for the Tour, which has struggled with ticket sales,\u201d according to the civil complaint filed on Friday by her attorney, Howard King.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was contractually allowed to say whatever she wanted on stage. M.I.A. now holds Kid Cudi accountable for his bad faith destruction of her contractual rights, business opportunities, and reputation,\u201d the complaint said. <\/p>\n

M.I.A. claimed Kid Cudi directed tour promoter Live Nation to fire her, though the company is not a defendant in this lawsuit.<\/p>\n

In a viral video<\/a> of her May 2 performance at the Dos Equis Pavilion shared by the artist herself, M.I.A. called herself \u201cillegal\u201d and said some in the audience \u201cmight be,\u201d and the caption with the video said she referred to herself as a Republican.<\/p>\n

In earlier shows on the tour, M.I.A. had spoken in support of Palestinian refugees and against ongoing policing actions by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the lawsuit claimed.<\/p>\n

M.I.A. has also previously expressed support for the Trump administration<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cDuring her performances on the Tour, M.I.A. made comments that were consistent with her public persona and prior performances,\u201d according to King.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore M.I.A. agreed to join the Tour, Kid Cudi was aware of M.I.A.\u2019s politically vocal reputation and her stances on immigration and genocide.\u201d<\/p>\n

A representative for Kid Cudi could not be immediately reached for comment on Monday.<\/p>\n

M.I.A. claims she\u2019s owed $2.8 million for the performances she agreed to do for the tour in addition to punitive damages.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"British rapper M.I.A. filed a multi-million-dollar lawsuit last week against Kid Cudi, accusing him of dropping her from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":678512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[88,216],"class_list":["post-678511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=678511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/678511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/678512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=678511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=678511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=678511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}