Kanye West’s visa canned over his extreme anti-Semitic views

Rapper Kanye West’s visa to Australia has been cancelled over the one-time star’s extreme anti-Semitic views, with Tony Burke declaring it was ‘not sustainable to import hatred’.

Kanye West leaves Sean Combs’s trial in New York in June. Picture: AP

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Rapper Kanye West’s visa to Australia has been cancelled over the one-time star’s extreme anti-Semitic views, with Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke declaring it was “not sustainable to import hatred”.

Mr Burke on Wednesday said the artist’s visa had been revoked after he released a song titled Heil Hitler, which officials decided promoted Nazism.

After selling millions of records and winning multiple Grammys in the 2000s and 2010s, West had a very public fall from grace marked by his mental health battles and his increasingly violent hate speech against Jewish people. West – once husband of Kim Kardashian – married Australian Bianca Censori in 2022, although the couple are believed to have since separated.

“He’s been coming to Australia for a long time,” Mr Burke told the ABC. “He’s got family here. And he’s made a lot of offensive comments that my officials looked at again once he released the Heil Hitler song and he no longer has a valid visa in Australia. He had a valid visa and he doesn’t now.”

He said officials concluded “if you’re going to have a song and promote that sort of Nazism, we don’t need that in Australia”.

The decision comes days after the US cancelled the visas of rap duo Bob Vylan over chants of “death to the IDF” at the Glastonbury festival in Britain.