Snoop Dogg, Rick Ross, and the Trump Inauguration Controversy
In the wake of Donald Trump’s 2025 inauguration, the internet is ablaze with debates over the participation of Snoop Dogg, Rick Ross, Nelly, and Soulja Boy in the inaugural festivities. But let’s be clear—only two of these names even warrant discussion.
I have no problem with Nelly performing at Trump’s Liberty Ball. Nelly is an entertainer, and he has always positioned himself as such. He has never claimed to be a gangster, a revolutionary, or a Black leader. He makes music, he performs for whoever pays him, and that’s his right. Let the man entertain.
As for Soulja Boy, let’s not even waste time discussing him. Grown folks are talking. Moving on.
Rappers Are Not Black Leaders—And We Need to Stop Treating Them Like They Are
The real issue here is Snoop Dogg and Rick Ross—not because they performed at Trump’s events, but because their presence exposes the falsehood they’ve been selling to Black America for years. Let’s be clear—neither of these men are Black leaders, nor have they ever been.
They don’t represent the Black community. They represent themselves. They don’t advocate for our interests. They advocate for record labels and corporations that own them. Their careers have been built on promoting a narrow, destructive subculture of hip-hop—gangsterism, excess, and false bravado. Yet, when it’s time to actually live up to that image, they crumble like Top’s cigarette paper.
Hip-hop is so much more than the gangster subculture that white-owned record labels spend millions promoting to Black communities. It is creativity, resistance, storytelling, and social movement. But Snoop Dogg and Rick Ross have never embodied hip-hop in its full complexity—only the image of the outlaw, the hustler, the gangster. And yet, no legitimate gangster, no real hood n*gga, no true block legend would ever perform on command for the government. Real street dudes don’t even use their government names, let alone align themselves with the very government that has criminalized Black men for generations.
Rick Ross has been selling a lie since the moment he stole the name of a real-life drug kingpin to build his rap persona. He was never a hustler. He was a correctional officer—the modern-day
overseer for his true masters. Yet, he has spent his career selling Black youth the fantasy that he’s a Miami drug kingpin, but the real Miami Cocaine Cowboys know he ain’t never served a block, let alone been ‘the Plug’ for the whole hood. Now, here he is, on a stage performing for the same government he supposedly rebelled against. 50 Cent called him out years ago, and he’s proving the point right now—Rick Ross was never what he claimed to be.
Then there’s Snoop Dogg, who has spent decades embodying the West Coast gangster persona, rising to fame through Death Row Records, one of the most legendary labels in hip-hop. But in 2017, when Trump first took office, Snoop himself said he would call out any “jigaboo” willing to perform for him. Now here he is, tuxedoed up, cooning to a crowd of Trump’s wealthiest donors.
So what does that say? That gangster persona was never real. And more importantly, these men know it’s not real—but they sell it anyway.
Stop Letting White Conservatives Use Rappers as Black Leaders
What we, as a community, need to address is why we continue to allow entertainers to represent us. Why are people angry at them? Because deep down, we have been conditioned to view rappers as our thought leaders. That’s a mistake.
Real Black leadership isn’t found in rappers who are nothing but contract employees for white-owned record labels. Rick Ross and Snoop Dogg didn’t do anything but put on a modern-day minstrel show for Trump. Trump likes these guys because he knows they are good at pushing mental poison into Black communities through their lyrics. Real Black leadership is in the people on the ground—activists, business leaders, educators, and policymakers—who actually work to build economic and social power in our communities.
If we’re going to look to hip-hop for leadership, then let’s recognize the real intellectuals and revolutionaries it has produced. Tupac Shakur, Chuck D of Public Enemy, and KRS-One—those were rappers who used their platforms to educate, uplift, and inspire change. Tupac didn’t just rap—he dissected systemic oppression and preached the power of economic independence. Chuck D exposed the political machine’s attacks on Black America. KRS-One built hip-hop as a tool of cultural enlightenment. These men were not just rappers—they were scholars of the street, voices of the people, and true thought leaders.
Now, the industry has replaced those thinkers with puppets—caricatures of what Black men are supposed to be.
A Call for Real Leadership
If we want to progress, we need to stop treating entertainers like they are our representatives. They are members of the Black community, but they are not its leaders. They have no stake in our struggles beyond what they can profit from. Their loyalty lies with the corporate entity that owns them—not with us.
Snoop Dogg and Rick Ross owe a massive apology—to the real hustlers, the dope boys, the trap kings who actually live the life they only rap about. Because what they just did? They didn’t just sell out themselves; they sold out the culture.
So I ask you—if the so-called gangsters we grew up listening to can be bought and paraded like puppets, then were they ever real to begin with?”
