Rapper Benzino says it’s his choice not to follow his daughter, fellow artist Coi Leray, on Instagram. Benzino was once a chart-topping rapper in the industry, but now his only daughter seems to be carrying the torch in their family.
The 58-year-old revealed his reasons for not following Leray during an appearance on the “No Jumper” podcast on Jan. 26. He revealed that he wanted to “visualize” her as his daughter instead of seeing videos of her twerking in a bikini on the platform.
“I can’t follow her Instagram,” he said. “Because then, you know, she could be in a bikini, you know, twerking or something. But, I love her to death, you know what I’m saying? So I want to be able to … visualize her the way I want to visualize her, as my daughter, not necessarily as an artist or as Coi. I don’t want to visualize my daughter like that.”
Fans reacted to Benzino’s comments on Instagram, and many agreed with the rapper not wanting to see his daughter in a certain light.
“Great answer. The smart folks will get it. No father wants to see his daughter half-naked. Good for you no neck,” wrote one fan. “I mean I don’t blame him he don’t wanna see her shaking that lil mcmuffin all on the gram,” added another. One fan replied, “Great perspective! And healthy boundaries.”
Benzino, who has spoken out before about his famous daughter, said it’s been a “challenge” watching his daughter as she creates her own footing as a rapper. But he no longer wishes to go back and forth with his only daughter online.
“If I had a handbook on being a father I would give it out for free,” he explained. “But I don’t.”
He previously criticized 51-year-old rapper Busta Rhymes for working with Leray and having her appear “half-naked” in his music video for “LUXURY LIFE.” Leray can be seen wearing small shorts that showed her buttocks and a bedazzled bikini with a fur coat in the video, and her father wasn’t pleased.
“The whole Busta Rhymes collaboration like he should’ve reached out to me,” Benzino said. “You don’t do no video with my daughter half-naked and, you know you a grown a– f—–g man. You should’ve reached out to me and said something. But it is what it is. You know she’s grown she can do what she want. But I wasn’t with that.”
The “Love and Hip Hop: Atlanta” alum also had a public dispute with the “No More Panties” rapper after she called him out for allegedly not supporting her and her mother during her youth. During an interview last June with Angie Martinez, Leray said her mother struggled to raise her while Benzino was living well.
The “Blick Blick” artist claimed that she experienced homelessness and slept in a car. In her 2022 hit single, “No More Parties,” Leray referenced her relationship with her father in the lyrics as she raps, “My daddy let me down, but I promise you I won’t let up.”
“We hit rock bottom, to the point where I remember coming home from school and there’s eviction notice on our door,” she told Martinez. “I would see my father online or whatever. Even when he would do ‘Love and Hip Hop.’ How you get to live this life, and we over here struggling?”
Benzino later claimed that Leray lied during the interview, saying she never slept in a car that he knew about. “I was with her mother until she was 9. Then I had her from 9 to 16, five months out the year, she be with me. She lived me with me twice. She lived here in Atlanta with me and she went to Campbell High School,” he said.
Leray clapped back and said she would not speak to her father again while adding, “I don’t wanna be your clout kid.” Benzino responded by saying that he made her, not the other way around. “You couldn’t walk in my f—g Adidas for an hour,” he added. “How can you get on here and say that you’re a clout, that I’m using you for clout? Coi. Coi. Your first record was disrespecting me.”
Leray also called out her dad for asking her for money, and he in turn called out Martinez for further stirring up drama between the two.
