Kanye West has called out Adidas once again after the apparel giant has moved forward with releasing what he calls “fake” Yeezy 350s, which the rapper claims are an unapproved design.
West — who now goes by Ye — got wind of Adidas’ plans to greenlight the “Steel Grey” 350 V2s featuring his designs and put his former business partner on blast on Instagram Monday (Feb. 26) while essentially calling for a boycott.
“Anybody who loves Ye would not buy these fake Yeezys I never made these color ways I’m not getting paid off of them and adidas is suing me,” he wrote in part in a lengthy caption alongside a screenshot of a photo of the footwear. “All the new non-approved 350’s are cooorny and everybody know the 350 been corny.”
Shortly after, Ye posted a video to Instagram explaining his feud with Adidas, and claimed the company was suing him while trying to sell the Yeezy line.
“Not only are they putting out fake colorways that are non-approved, they’re suing me for $250 million and they’re also not paying me for these shoes that they’re putting out that have my name on it,” he claimed, speaking through his titanium dentures.
A spokesman for Adidas did not return a request for comment from Billboard.
Ye’s statements came after Adidas announced Monday that it would sell some of its remaining Yeezy inventory — a tricky problem for the company after splitting with Ye in 2022 following his string of hate speech and antisemitic comments. Since discontinuing the partnership, Adidas says it has donated some proceeds from such sales to groups that “combat discrimination and hate, including racism and antisemitism.”
As of Monday afternoon, there’s no evidence that Adidas has filed any kind of new lawsuit against West or his companies. But last year, Adidas disclosed that it had filed a private arbitration case against West’s Yeezy LLC in December 2022 on the grounds that West’s “racist, antisemitic, and other offensive public statements and conduct” had violated their partnership agreement and had caused “considerable damage to its brand.”
In claiming on Monday that Adidas was “suing” him, West could be referring to that arbitration case. It’s unclear whether $250 million is at stake in that case, or even whether that case is still ongoing, since arbitration proceedings are — by design — litigated behind closed doors.
There had appeared to be a possible path toward reconciliation between Ye and Adidas after the rapper was photographed meeting with the company CEO Bjorn Gulden last week, but that doesn’t look to be the case any longer.
The company started to sell Yeezy products again in May 2023 after cutting ties with the Chicago-bred rap star, and attempted to freeze $75 million worth of Yeezy funds in his bank account. A judge overturned the order to freeze the money a week later.