Labour and Conservative MPs have demanded the government seek to bar Kanye West from entering the country as criticism of his headline performance at the forthcoming Wireless Festival mounted.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and the home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, are being urged to intervene to prevent the controversial rapper – who has glorified Adolf Hitler and the Nazis on multiple occasions, released a track entitled Heil Hitler and sold merchandise bearing a swastika – from appearing at the festival.
The calls came as drinks manufacturer Diageo has become the second major festival sponsor to pull its support, following Pepsi, in the wake of the backlash surrounding the booking.
West, who goes by “Ye”, is due to headline all three nights at the Wireless Festival in Finsbury Park, north London, in July, marking his first performances in the UK in over a decade. In October 2022, in a post on X he said he was going to go “death con 3 on Jewish people [sic]” and later denied the Holocaust on a far-right talk show.
Last spring West released the track Heil Hitler, which contained an extract of a speech from the Nazi leader. This followed the sale on his website of T-shirts featuring a swastika.
His outbursts led to him being dropped by commercial partners including Adidas. He has issued multiple apologies over the years before going on to make further explicitly antisemitic comments.
MPs and senior politicians have now echoed Jewish community leaders, suggesting the performance should be called off.
Speaking to The Daily Telegraph, Luke Akehurst, the Labour MP for North Durham, said: “It's certainly an option we should be looking at given he's gone from being one of the world's most impressive artists to releasing a song called Heil Hitler.”
Another Labour MP, who is Jewish but was not named, told the newspaper that the possibility of blocking West ‘s UK visa “should certainly be explored”.
And Lord Austin, the UK’s trade envoy to Israel, said: “The organisers should cancel his invitation and if not, the council should not allow the festival to go ahead.”
Elsewhere, the shadow home secretary, Chris Philp, announced this morning he had written to Mahmood asking her to “use her powers to ban West from travelling to the UK to appear at the Wireless concert”.
Philp said of the home secretary: “She says she wants to fight antisemitism. Now will now find out how serious she really is.”
In his letter to Mahmood Philp described West’s visit as “deeply concerning” pointing out that his behaviour was not a “one-off lapse”.
"His partial apologies have been retracted in the past and do not atone for what he has said,” Philp wrote.
He noted that Mahmood has the power to “exclude individuals whose presence is not conducive to the public good” and that she had exercised them earlier this year by refusing to grant entry to a far-right Dutch activist, Eva Vlaardingerbroek.
"The same principle should be applied consistently,” Philp said.
Starmer has already described West’s Wireless billing as “deeply concerning” but neither he nor Mahmood have commented on the demands to block the rapper from entering the UK.
In January, West took out a full-page advert in the Wall Street Journal to apologise for his behaviour.
The advert, which took the form of a letter to “those I have hurt”, attributed his actions to a bipolar disorder, resulting from an injury in a car accident that had only been diagnosed many years later.
In early 2025, he fell into “a four-month long manic episode of psychotic, paranoid and impulsive behaviour that destroyed my life,” he said.
In that “fractured state”, he explained, “I gravitated toward the most destructive symbol I could find, the swastika, and even sold T-shirts bearing it…
“I regret and am deeply mortified by my actions in that state, and am committed to accountability, treatment, and meaningful change. It does not excuse what I did though. I am not a Nazi or an antisemite. I love Jewish people.”
Last week, Board of Deputies president Phil Rosenberg told the BBC programme Newsnight that the government should block West from entering the country as “his presence would not be conducive to the public good”.
Other community groups objecting to West’s Wireless appearances include the Jewish Leadership Council, the Community Security Trust and Campaign Against Antisemitism.
Over the weekend, the festival’s biggest sponsor, Pepsi, said in a statement: “Pepsi has decided to withdraw its sponsorship of Wireless Festival”. Diageo – the parent company of drinks brands Johnnie Walker and Captain Morgan – has followed suit, announcing: “We have informed the organisers of our concerns and as it stands, Diageo will not sponsor the 2026 Wireless festival."
Other sponsors include fellow drinks brand Budweiser, PayPal and transport company Big Green Coach. The JC has approached the firms for comment.
It has also emerged that Tottenham Hotspur FC, which has a strong historical connection with the Jewish community, reportedly refused to allow West to perform their stadium prior to his Wireless gigs.
“As part of his big music comeback, [West’s management team] thought he warranted a headline run of shows and chose the Tottenham stadium as their venue of choice,” a unnamed source told The Sun newspaper.
“But when they approached Tottenham with their proposal, the club rejected it,” they continued.
“There was no way they would allow Kanye to perform at the club given its history with the Jewish community.”
Spurs declined to comment when approached by the JC.
Wireless has described West’s UK performances as “an extraordinary chapter in Wireless's story”.
Wireless and the Home Office were approached for comment.
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