Kanye West created an app to promote his rap music, promoting a racist environment with brutal working conditions – while his wife, Bianca Censorsent pornographic videos to employees that were accessible to minors, according to a new lawsuit.
The bombshell lawsuit, filed in a U.S. District Court, named Ye and his former chief of staff, Milo Yiannopoulosas defendants.
The lawsuit alleges that Kanye and company engaged in “forced labor and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.”
The two were accused of making false promises to pay their adult and minor employees and forcing them to work insanely long hours, while being openly mocked with racist slurs and called “New Slaves.”
It all started in the spring of 2024 when Ye decided to launch the streaming service app YZYVSN to rival Tidal, Spotify and Apple Music. The suit says Ye wanted to avoid paying these companies to promote his new albums, “Vultures” and “Vultures 2.”
So he and Milo allegedly hired an international group of developers made up of several black members, which also included teenagers under the age of 14.
The documents say employees worked primarily remotely, maintaining constant communication with Ye, Milo and their team using digital and online communication apps such as Discord, Zoom and Slack.
In April 2024, the documents say, Milo promised to pay the group of developers $120,000 after they completed the application and if they agreed to the working conditions and did not complain.
But things quickly got worse… the lawsuit says Ye ordered all employees to sign nondisclosure agreements, threatening to fire the minors and refusing to pay them if they didn’t. Smaller developers were also forced to sign “volunteer” agreements.
Ye’s white managers who supervised foreign and minority workers then allegedly used derogatory language to create a hostile work environment.
In group chats, Caucasian managers used harassing language toward subordinates regarding age, race, gender, sexual orientation, and national origin. Some team members were called “slaves”, while others were called “new slaves”.
The documents say Milo once sent a chat message with a black/brown skin emoji to an African-American staff member while calling a younger worker a school shooter. Employees were also intimidated into working long hours into the night without pay or sleep.
Then, in late April, Ye announced that he was launching an adult film business called “Yeezy Pornwith his wife Bianca sending a worker a file-sharing link containing hardcore sexual activity, according to the documents. The minors were not protected from watching the lewd videos while developing Ye’s porn app. Bianca is not named as a defendant.
On May 1, 2024, after a period of intense rush to produce the app, the team reportedly presented Ye with one of the finished apps, but it is unclear from the documents which one. Ye and Milo allegedly never paid the employees for their hard work, which is what led them to file the lawsuit.
The lawsuit seeks compensation for unpaid wages and overtime, as well as emotional distress.
We reached out to Ye and Milo… so far, no response.