While us average citizens received COVID stipends in the mail to help run our small businesses or keep cleaning products in the house, celebrities had access to their own program too. However, a bombshell report revealed what some of those celebs spent their pandemic funds on.
Let’s just say they balled all the way out.
A recent report from Business Insider took a dive into the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant (SVOG) program which was intended to support the arts and entertainment back in 2020. Of the 13,000 arts groups that received federal funding were arts academies around the country but also wealthy, wealthy musicians. How the grant applications were approved by the Small Business Administration is still up for debate given musicians weren’t specifically considered eligible, per BI’s report. However, the funds were approved someway.
BI placed a lens on how rapper Lil Wayne and R&B singer Chris Brown spent their funds which may or may not have been … legal. According to accounting records obtained by the outlet, Lil Wayne received $8.9 million in grant money and blew $1.38 million of it on private jets, another $2 million to pay off debt to a former manager and other hundreds of thousands on designer clothes from Balenciaga to Marni. Another $15,000 was reportedly spent on flight and hotel accommodations for women.
Brown, on the other hand, received $10 million in grant funds. The report says half of it was pocketed by the singer and documents show he spent another $80,000 on a birthday party to cover things ranging from nude, painted models, hookah, bottle service and “nitrogen ice cream.” Brown reportedly spent another $24,000 to take his tour to Mexico (where he did not perform), per expense reports via Business Insider. There, he spent a few days in Tulum filming a video with Jack Harlow. The biggest bucks he spent went to his manager, Anthony Wilson, his accountants at NKSFB, attorneys and crew payroll, per the report.
Other artists who also benefited from the SVOG program were DJ Marshmello who pocketed $9.9 million and Alice in Chains’ touring company who received $1.4 million.
Though the disbursement of the funds to the wealthy one-percenters wasn’t decidedly fraudulent, it raised enough concern about how the applications were approved in the first place. A report from the SBA’s inspector general found the agency relaxed anti-fraud control on the front end of the grant process and noted issues with what recipients spent money on only after the fact, per BI’s report.
Who cares anyway what rich people spend their money on?
Well, it matters when the money they’re spending is coming from American taxpayer pockets. The chair of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Sen. Gary Peters, said BI’s findings show the SVOG program was “an abuse of federal resources.” While COVID relief was intended to help those smaller businesses and arts programs, it was not meant to go to “super wealthy celebrities,” he told the outlet.