Cardi B has had plenty of run-ins with conservative pundits in 2020, largely thanks to "WAP," but she's not letting it bother her. In an interview with Billboard, Cardi gave her thoughts on the response to the Megan Thee Stallion-featuring No. 1 single and her outspoken politics this year, criticizing Republican pundits and explaining she doesn't want to magnify their audiences.
Cardi noted how she helped the far-right, anti-choice Candace Owens gain followers. "There's certain people I want to curse out, but I don't want to give them clout," she said. "For example, when me and Candace Owens got into an argument, I gave that bitch 2 million followers."
Owens, who once suggested Hitler was a "national socialist" who "just wanted to make Germany great and have things run well," has been predictably critical of Cardi this year. As Uproxx pointed out, Owens said the Invasion of Privacy artist's music "contributes to the disintegration of Black culture and values." She currently has 2.8 million to Cardi's 14.4M.
In order to not direct even more attention to Owens, Cardi has instead decided it would be better to shade these individuals on her OnlyFans account instead.
"I’d rather just go to my OnlyFans because it’s only my fans there," she said. "If you a hating-ass bitch and you pay $4.99 to see me talk shit, you not really someone that hates Cardi. You a bitch that really loves Cardi." Cardi launched her OnlyFans account earlier this year, sharing behind-the-scenes footage from the "WAP" video amid much more content. She added that she uses OnlyFans for "certain things that I want to get more personal on, and I don't want to get on Instagram Live and talk about it because blogs are gonna chop it up."
Asked what it was like to see fans singing "WAP" outside the White House after Biden was projected to be the president-elect, she said, "I just feel like it was such a big victory for me and for Megan. I’m so used to listening to raunchy female rap music since I was a little girl—Trina, Khia, Lil’ Kim, Jacki-O, Foxy [Brown]."
The outrage over the track and its video was swift, but Cardi found joy in it. "'WAP,' to me, was just a regular raunchy female rap song, but it caused so much controversy," she continued, referencing how the likes of Ben Shapiro and Candace Owens were supposedly so shocked by the mere existence of the hit collaboration. "So many Republicans—not just any Republicans that got an Instagram following, but a lot of Republicans that got blue checks [on Twitter] and millions of followers, [like Ben] Shapiro, Candace Owens, Tomi Lahren—were talking so much crap about 'WAP.' So it was just a victory for me seeing people celebrating Biden’s win with my and Megan’s song. Power of the pussy, ya heard?!"
When asked about her confidence to stand up to figures who engage in manipulative, bullying tactics on social media, Cardi said she does it because "the things that they say don't make sense." Shortly after Biden was named victorious in the 2020 election, Cardi was quick to call out Owens and Shapiro, who criticized her for interviewing the soon-to-be 46th president. "If I feel like Joe Biden is doing something wrong, I'm not going to stand by," she said in the new interview, highlighting how so many conservatives will never dare criticize Donald Trump no matter how deranged he acts.
"A lot of these Trump supporters don’t understand why people say, 'Black lives matter.' People didn’t go looting because Trump was president—they went looting because there’s a lot of Black men getting killed unjustly," Cardi continued.
"A lot of Republicans think that we hate the police. Personally, there was a point when I did hate the cops because I had really bad experiences growing up with the cops, but I also met cops that are really good people and have really good hearts. I just feel like we need to hire more people like that."
Elsewhere, Cardi addressed the criticism leveled against her after she called herself "retarded" for accidentally posting a topless photo. "I was getting chewed up because I said the R-word," she said, referring to a voice memo she shared on Twitter. "Like, how you gonna cancel me for calling myself retarded? They want you to be Mother Teresa, they want you to put out music, and they want you to look a certain way. It’s like, 'Y’all gotta chill—I’m just a regular-degular bitch, man.'"
