U.S. Senator Rand Paul has slammed the government for giving millions of dollars in Covid-19 relief money to bands such as Slipknot, Korn, Nickelback, and others. He questioned the suitability of supporting rock bands with public funds during the pandemic.
In a report highlighting the government’s spending issues, he denounced the government for squandering money on the grant program.
The grants were supposed to help venues and artists who suffered from the COVID-19 lockdowns, but many famous touring artists, like Slipknot, The Smashing Pumpkins, and Nickelback, also received millions from the program.
Paul raised doubts about how the funds were used, pointing out that artists did not have to use the money to pay their staff, and there was no accountability for how the money was spent.
Paul said that “so-called ‘small business owners,’ like Post Malone, Lil Wayne, Chris Brown, and Smashing Pumpkins, got up to $10 million each. Even Nickelback got $2 million.”
The report revealed that Slipknot got a hefty $9.7 million from the grant. Their ‘Knotfest’ festival also got $1,050,736. Korn received $5.3 million, Melissa Etheridge got $3.9 million, Usher got $3.1 million, and Leann Rimes got $2 million. Many other recording artists also benefited from the grant funds.
Paul was worried about how the money was spent. He said that some might say that these funds were used to support the staff, but artists did not have to do that. So, there was no way of knowing how these free funds were actually used.