California attempting to collect $600,000 in unpaid taxes from Ye's apparel brand, report says

Yeezy Apparel, a fashion company run by embattled rapper Ye, owes at least $600,000 in unpaid taxes to the state of California, NBC News reported Wednesday.

Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, reportedly owns and manages the Yeezy brand, and has recently claimed that four of his personal accounts have been frozen due to tax debt, NBC reported. Now, it appears that the six figures that Yeezy owes to California may be a significant addition to his financial woes.

At least three separate letters have been sent to Ye since July 2021 regarding the company's debt, per NBC. The letters came in the form of state tax liens, which the outlet noted is "a claim made on a person or entity's assets in response to an alleged debt."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

"Multiple California tax liens, adding up to $600,000, that's certainly a sign of either extreme incompetence or extreme cash problems," USC law professor Edward McCaffery told NBC.

This marks yet another chapter in the controversies surrounding Ye, whose recently espoused antisemitic views caused him to lose numerous business deals. This includes being dropped from a shoe deal with Adidas estimated to have a negative impact of at least $246 million on the rapper.

Ye was estimated to have lost massive amounts of wealth as a result of the fallout from his comments, and Forbes recently removed him from their list of billionaires. However, even after all the backlash, Ye doubled down on his views, appearing on the radio show of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and openly praising Adolf Hitler.