Government COVID grants lined pockets of Lil Wayne, Chris Brown, and more stars

Remember when instead of giving Americans $2,000 for the third stimulus check, President Joe Biden sent out $1,400 (so that the final two stimulus payments totaled $2,000)? Yeah, if that made you mad back in 2021, you are not going to want to hear about what the music industry was doing with COVID money. A new Business Insider investigation reveals that numerous wealthy stars took advantage of a law called the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant to pay for hotel rooms, private jets, high-end fashion and more—all on the taxpayer’s dime. 

The Shuttered Venue Operators Grant was “established as a lifeline for struggling independent venues and arts groups during the pandemic,” per BI, but the accountants and money managers for the stars realized that some major musicians would be eligible for grants “via their loan-out companies—corporate entities used to handle the business of touring.” In other words, rich and famous people were granted up to $10 million each that was meant for “ordinary and necessary” expenses for their entertainment businesses. 

As you can imagine, these rich and famous people—which includes Lil Wayne, Chris Brown, DJ Marshmello, and members of Alice in Chains—were not using that money for “ordinary and necessary” expenses. For instance, Lil Wayne spent “nearly $15,000 worth of flights and luxury hotel rooms for women whose connection to Lil Wayne’s touring operation was unclear, including a waitress at a Hooters-type restaurant and a porn actress,” BI reports. Marshmello’s entire $9.9 million grant went right into his own pockets. Chris Brown paid himself $5.1 million dollars and separately threw himself and $80,000 birthday party. (Again, this is all on the dime of taxpayers, of which Brown is historically not one, having recently settled millions in debt with the IRS.) Many of the artists investigated paid themselves and their lawyers, managers, and accountants, with little money going to the roadies, techs, and other touring professionals whose livelihoods were most threatened by the pandemic. 

It’s worth noting that the grants did do good for some of the live entertainment professionals it was actually intended to help (at least one of them, the founder of an acting school, is interviewed in the piece). But some sources inside the Small Business Administration who worked on the program were appalled by the fraud that took place and felt shut down when they tried to raise concerns. “I was never so disappointed in my fellow man than in that program. The graft was unbelievable,” one of the source told the outlet. Most of the artists declined to comment; according to BI, when “Reached by text, Lil Wayne made a sexually explicit overture to a reporter and did not respond to questions.” You can read the full, upsetting report here.