If you want a book full of burns for Labor Day weekend, Eminem dropped a surprise album, Kamikaze, overnight that will scratch your itch to yell at the world. In his tongue twisting first track, "The Ringer," Em also dropped some presidential scoop.
You may remember that Eminem unexpectedly roasted Trump on the BET Awards in October of 2017. The award show clip went viral immediately. And that was the last we heard of it, because Trump didn't blast out a 2 a.m. tweet on the matter (which, in retrospect, is the truly surprising part of that moment).
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On "The Ringer," which starts with Eminem saying, "I feel like I wanna punch the world in the fuckin' face right now," the rapper goes in on everyone he considers a weak MC in the game — which apparently includes everyone except Kendrick Lamar, J. Cole, and Big Sean. He also gets into the Trump freestyle, which apparently lost him fans. Eminem raps that if he could go back in time, he would reword that moment to be more about empathizing with Dreamers and the marginalized people that Trump has disenfranchised rather than focusing so much on insulting him.
And he'd like to know why Trump, whom he calls "Agent orange," didn't respond publicly but reveals that there was some private outreach, saying:
"But I think it's worth it / These verses are makin' him a wee bit nervous / And he's too scurred to answer me with words / 'Cause he knows that he will lyrically get murdered / But I know at least he's heard it / 'Cause Agent Orange just sent the Secret Service / To meet in person to see if I really think of hurtin' him / Or ask if I'm linked to terrorists / I said, "Only when it comes to ink and lyricists."
Eminem then drops a snarky bit of wordplay on Trump, saying, "But my beef is more media journalists / (Hold up, hold up, hold up…) / I said my beef is more meaty, a journalist." And, hold up, hold up, that verse ends with a lewd suggestion for music journalists — his album has been getting "panned to death," apparently. Well, it is a dis track. Don't ever let them tell you that Trump dismissing the media isn't a celebrity tactic, because everyone who is famous seems to operate from that playbook.