‘F–K DIAGEO’: Kanye West Sends Shots at Booze Behemoth During Unhinged Social Media Rant — Here’s Why

Kanye West walking on the red carpet during the 67th Grammy Awards held at Crypto.com Arena on Feb. 2 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Elyse Jankowski/Sipa USA)(Sipa via AP Images)

On Thursday night into the wee hours of Friday morning, Kanye West went on yet another all-caps rant on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.

The hip-hop legend turned nazi sympathizer, slavery apologist and billionaire went on and on and on and on about a myriad of topics: his wife’s scandalous outfits, which he describes as “dressing naked”; slavery being a choice (yep, he’s still dying on that hill); a Sean John clothing collaboration with the notorious Sean “Diddy” Combs; the enjoyment he gets out of the occasional lawn-mowing; his distaste for plus-size models in the fashion industry; his anti-semitism; Adolf Hitler’s “freshness”; and Elon Musk stealing West’s “NAZI SWAG” at Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration.

He even predicted he’d win 20 Grammys and perform at the Super Bowl in 2026. Nothing wrong with aiming high, right?

A common theme in the rant was West’s vitriol for cancel culture — he lamented about abuser Chris Brown (who’s still been making music and seems to be doing just fine financially despite his ) and the notorious Diddy being unjustly canceled.

In the middle of the spew came a pair of posts addressing Diageo, the spirits giant behind brands like Johnnie Walker, Smirnoff, Captain Morgan, Tanqueray, Baileys and many more.

“F–K DIAGEO,” West wrote at 10:51 p.m. ET. A minute later, he followed it up with a longer, less cogent ramble:

While West didn’t explain his anti-Diageo stance we have a guess.

Why Is Kanye West So Furious With Diageo?

West himself has never been part of a spirits brand, to our knowledge. Combs, however, was famously the face of a very successful Diageo-owned vodka brand, CÎROC, and co-owned DeLeón Tequila through a joint venture partnership with Diageo.

In May 2023, Combs filed a lawsuit against Diageo, accusing the mega-corporation of mismanagement and racial discrimination. Combs alleged Diageo neglected his tequila brand, instead pouring resources into their other tequila brands, namely Don Julio and George Clooney’s Casamigos.

“Diageo has typecasted Cîroc and DeLeon, apparently deciding they are ‘Black brands’ that should be targeted only to ‘urban’ consumers,” Combs’ lawsuit argued, while claiming Diageo refused to properly market or invest in DeLeón Tequila.

In June 2023, Diageo cut ties with Combs.

“We are saddened that Mr. Combs has chosen to recast a business dispute as anything other than that and chosen to damage a productive and valued partnership,” the company said in a Manhattan federal court filing. “Mr. Combs’ bad-faith actions have clearly breached his contracts and left us no choice but to move to dismiss his baseless complaint and end our business relationship.

“We funded the purchase of DeLeón for the joint venture and proceeded to invest more than $100 million to grow the brand. Despite having made nearly a billion dollars over the course of our 15-year relationship, Mr. Combs contributed a total of $1,000 and refused to honor his commitments.”

In January 2024, Combs dropped the lawsuit.

It’s no surprise that West, who has made it abundantly clear over the years that he loves being as controversial as possible, rushed to Combs’ defense in his X tirade, calling for the billionaire business mogul and musician’s freedom.

Combs faces a slew of lawsuits and accusations, including, sexual harassment, sexual assault, rape and gang-rape, rape of minors, battery, sex trafficking and racketeering.

It feels like a safe assumption, given how focused West seems to be on Diddy, that his anti-Diageo posts are fueled by anger on Combs’ behalf.

In October, a report surfaced that West was hoping to launch his own whiskey brand. So, Diddy stuff aside, our only other guess would be that Diageo was somehow involved in that reported venture — which hasn’t materialized — and things went sour. However, that seems much less likely. West’s proclivity for saying and posting frankly insane things have made him a massive brand risk, and there’s no reason to believe a company as big as Diageo would want to jeopardize itself by working with him.