Grammy Award-winning artist John Legend is once again in the spotlight after a video surfaced in which he labeled President Donald Trump a “white supremacist” at an event held earlier this year.
The video, which began circulating widely on social media this week, was recorded at The Fifteen Percent Pledge’s 15th Street Block Party in Hollywood, California, in February 2025. In the footage, Legend critiques Trump’s leadership and questions his stance on racial issues.
“He’s a bigot… It’s a belief that there’s a hierarchy of racial groups and that his group is genetically superior,” Legend stated in the video, a remark that received applause from the audience.
During the same event, Legend contrasted former Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, a four-star general, with Pete Hegseth, a conservative media figure and Trump appointee, suggesting racial bias in Trump’s staffing choices. “That’s the level of bigotry he has — any white man is better than that,” Legend added.
Legend also commented on Trump’s 2024 election victory. “America made a decision that I strongly disagree with, and it seems that we are reaping the whirlwind right now,” he stated, just months after Trump assumed office on January 20, 2025.
Legend further described Trump as a “terrible leader, especially in crisis,” accusing him of “blaming, misinforming, and dividing people” instead of uniting them, which would have been a “smart and responsible and good political way to handle it,” he continued.
The context of Legend’s remarks includes the controversy involving Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Hegseth, a former Fox News host, was appointed by Trump to replace Lloyd Austin, who was the first Black Secretary of Defense under the Biden administration. Hegseth has recently been criticized for security breaches related to sharing sensitive military information in group chats.
Critics have noted that when Austin faced health challenges during his tenure, Trump called for his resignation, declaring that Austin “should be fired immediately for improper professional conduct and dereliction of duty,” Trump stated.
This is not Legend’s first public criticism of Trump. The singer has a history of speaking against the president, dating back to Trump’s initial campaign. In 2016, Legend engaged with Donald Trump Jr. on Twitter, calling Trump Sr. a racist.
“I think they were protesting your racist father. This isn’t complicated,” Legend wrote in response to Trump Jr.’s tweet about protesters at a Chicago, Illinois, campaign rally.
When Trump Jr. suggested that racism “can’t be the answer for everything you don’t like,” Legend responded, “No. It’s just the answer when racist racists are saying racist s—t and are endorsed by the KKK,” referencing endorsements from Ku Klux Klan members for Trump’s candidacy.
In 2019, Legend intensified his criticism following Trump’s comments about Baltimore, Maryland, and Representative Elijah Cummings. “Our president is a flaming racist,” Legend told TMZ outside a Los Angeles, California, nightclub.
The conflict between Legend and Trump became more personal that year when Trump referred to Legend’s wife, Chrissy Teigen, as “filthy-mouthed” after she used a profane term for him. Trump responded by calling Legend a “boring musician.”
The resurfaced video has sparked strong reactions on social media from both Trump supporters and critics. Many of Trump’s backers have denounced Legend’s remarks as divisive and hypocritical.
“Only a Democrat could claim ‘Trump is divisive’ in one breath and say ‘MAGA is white supremacist’ in the next,” wrote one critic on social media.
Another commenter highlighted perceived media bias, stating, “If President Trump ever said anything like this, it would be played by legacy media on repeat. This is projection 101; John Legend is the divisive racist,” another said.
Legend, whose legal name is John Roger Stephens, continues his activism on various issues. Recently, he responded to Trump’s controversial remarks about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio.
In a September 2024 Instagram video, Legend spoke “not as a singer but as a native of Springfield,” commending immigrants as “hardworking and ambitious” and noting they commit “less crime than native-born Americans.” He urged his followers to “love one another” instead of promoting what he described as xenophobic rhetoric.
The Fifteen Percent Pledge, founded by Aurora James, challenges retailers to allocate at least 15% of their shelf space to Black-owned brands. The February block party aimed to raise funds for Black-owned businesses affected by the Los Angeles wildfires.