A recent video of Grammy award-winning rapper Killer Mike offering a solution to America’s child support crisis has gone viral and is now receiving criticism from many in the Black community. Critics of Killer Mike believe his incentive proposal lacks accountability and is one-sided, rewarding sexual irresponsibility on the part of young Black men.
During a panel discussion last month at that rapper’s Swag barbershop featuring independent presidential candidate Robert Kennedy Jr., Killer Mike says he has devised a two-year plan for teen boys and young adult males who are expecting a child.
“[The] first two years are debt-free. You don’t have to pay the government anything back, so she doesn’t get to drag him in the court,” the Grammy Award winner said in the video, which is posted on the Blacks For Kennedy TikTok page. “The court doesn’t say you owe us money for investing in your child through food programs, through early head start programs, because in those two years, the boy has the option or he has to demand or the command to then go to a trade school.”
He suggested an executive order for young men to attend trade schools should be made. It would, according to the hip-hop economist, help not just the father but the country, as he claims there are not enough tradespeople in the nation.
“The girls are going to college and graduating. They have no men to marry because the boys are not going to college in the same way. My teachers were married to tradesmen. My teacher, who we call doctor, her husband owns the locksmith company [or] her husband was a mechanic.”
He said an additional way to solve the child support problem along with the nation’s infrastructure problem, aside from creating more tradesmen, is to give incentives for the young men to marry the young women they impregnated.
Those incentives would include zero financing on home loans and a shot at getting a quality home through the federal HUD program.
Killer Mike suggests this “strengthens our community, the Black community, and strengthens the greater community because now you have more American marriages, you have people with stronger financial stability, and you have great people married to women of education.”
He suggests this would shift teen fathers to being taxpayers and not tax takers and provide a way to support both young mothers and fathers.
Some on the X platform blasted his proposal.
“So what if homeboy gets multiple girls pregnant?? He gonna end up with a Ph.D. by the time he’s finished,” one person tweeted.
So what if homeboy gets multiple girls pregnant?? He gonna end up with a PHD by the time he’s finished 😩😩😩😩
— Notch (@Notchypoo) February 20, 2024
“What happens to the child during the 2 years,” another wrote.
A TikTok user asked why young boys are not being taught to take accountability, bringing up the point that during the two-year timeframe, the mother will be left with the sole financial responsibility of raising the child.
“In that time, she’s going to be pregnant and going to have medical bills. She’s going to have to feed herself as well as her child, who will then be a toddler. But for two years, he goes to trade school,” she said, further explaining that this does not stop the young man from impregnating more than one young lady, and regardless of an incentive to marry, he can only marry one person.
@cfstory This is stupid
♬ original sound – Colorfull Story
Not everyone thought his ideas were off-base and thoughtless. Some charged his critics to find a better resolution to the problem.
“Yall gotta do more than just disagree, provide some alternative solutions; it’s easy to say he’s wrong but harder to come up with answers… let’s hear your solutions lol,” one person submitted.
The “Scientist & Engineers” rapper has been in the headlines multiple times since winning three Grammy statues at the 2024 celebration.
Outlets reported that he was arrested after his wins for getting into a conflict with a security guard at the show. He was released shortly thereafter, but not before the arrest and the wins plastered the internet.
The Atlanta native and former Morehouse student also was the talk of the town when he made a hard statement about Black men marrying Black women.
“When it comes to marriage, you should marry a Black woman because who’s going to understand me like a Black woman,” the rapper said on The Breakfast Club. “Who [going to] understand my pain, my strife, my struggle? Who’s going to understand culturally how important it is for my Black children to be proud to be Black even when she didn’t birth these children?”
He also stated that few of his critics could check him about his Blackness, particularly if they are not nation-building with a Black spouse, because he wakes up with one every day, Shana Render.
He boasted that even after he was arrested during the Grammys, it was his Black queen that met him when he was released.
