A day after celebrating the life and legacy of her father, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Bernice King now finds herself feuding with rapper Sexyy Red.
At about 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, King, the CEO of the King Center, posted a scathing rebuke of the rapper, who had recently posted what appeared to be an AI-generated photo, as well as superimposed images of herself and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
In one of the images, King, who would have been 96 this year, and Sexyy Red are holding hands and gazing into each other’s eyes on what appears to be a dance floor.
In another, Sexyy Red has superimposed images of herself and Chicago rapper Chief Keef alongside King, as he leads the 1963 March on Washington. She is wearing a revealing red outfit and holding a stack of money.
The caption reads: “Happy MLK Day!!”
“This is intentionally distasteful, dishonoring, deplorable, and disrespectful to my family and my father, who is not here to respond himself because he was assassinated for working for your civil and human rights and to end war and poverty,” Bernice King wrote on X. “Please delete.”
Reps for the rapper couldn’t be immediately reached for comment, but late Tuesday, she offered an apology on X.
“You ain’t wrong, never meant to disrespect your family my apologies,” she posted. “Just resposted something I saw that I thought was innocent.”
This isn’t the first time that the St. Louis rapper has caused political controversy.
In 2023, the “Pound Town” artist voiced support for now President Donald Trump, stating that pandemic-era loans changed how he was perceived among the Black community.
However, Sexyy Redd reversed course one year later and revealed her vote for former Vice President Kamala Harris.
“I just voted!!! Don’t tell us what to do with our coochies!! #Kamala4President,” she wrote on X at the time.
Like her mother Coretta Scott King and late brother Dexter King before her, Bernice King and her brother Martin Luther King III have taken on the responsibility of protecting their father’s intellectual property.
When King was alive, he made little money and a bulk of what he did make — in speaking engagements or awards — he donated to Civil Rights causes. But he copyrighted his speeches and in the years since his death, the King estate has doggedly protected his works by challenging commercial use of his image, filing suits over the use of his copyrighted speeches and policing the use of his recorded voice.
Credit: Ben Fernandez/Special to the AJC
Credit: Ben Fernandez/Special to the AJC
On two occasions, in lawsuits against CBS and USA Today, the estate objected when the media used King’s words. But the estate has also set up lucrative commercial endeavors, which have seen King’s image sold to corporations who have used him as a pitchman.
In 2006, former Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin led a citywide effort to buy a major collection of papers that belonged to King for $32 million.
Known as the Morehouse College Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Collection, the 10,000 papers and books, spanning from 1944 to 1968, are now housed at the National Center for Civil and Human Rights in downtown Atlanta.
Credit: John Spink
Credit: John Spink
In the age of social media and now artificial intelligence, it has become harder to safeguard King’s image. Almost every year around King’s Jan. 15 birthday, party fliers surface of a blinged-out King.
In 2018, on the 55th anniversary of the March on Washington, Bernice King called rapper Cardi B’s bawdy portrayal of her mother Coretta Scott King in a clip that appeared on TMZ, “repulsive.”
Within hours, Bernice King tweeted that the “Bodak Yellow” rapper had apologized.
In 2023, the King family voiced new concerns over a rash of AI images featuring King with Donald Trump. The images portrayed King and Trump, ideological opposites who never met, as friends.
In several of the images Trump has his arm around King’s shoulder. In one of the visuals, they embrace. In another black and white image, which garnered more than 11 million views, the two were falsely depicted walking together, triumphantly.
The caption: “Two of our nation’s greatest advocates for Civil Rights: MLK and DJT.”
“We are navigating through some of the most dangerous waters that we have ever experienced in our nation,” said King III at the time. “When you create a false narrative, which AI is doing in this case, you are not teaching history accurately. There are no boundaries. There are no guardrails.”
By 6:45 p.m., Sexyy Red had deleted the dancing image, but the marching image remained.
Sexyy Red last performed in Atlanta in December, as a special guest for Lil Baby’s birthday bash at State Farm Arena. She was slated for last year’s One MusicFest but pulled out “due to unforeseen circumstances” on the day of her scheduled show.
Bernice King said she doesn’t believe Sexyy Red is a “degenerate,” “ghetto,” or “trash,” as many of the comments supporting the King family suggested.
“I have spoken out in the past about the use of and comparison to either of my parents to denigrate other people. I just don’t understand this type of use of my father’s image (on King Day no less), in a way that does not convey what we know to be true about his service and sacrifice,” she wrote.
“Even if you disagree with him or with his tactics or even believe things said about him by people who hated him, why do this?”
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