Kid Rock denies Detroit Free Press credentials for Little Caesars Arena concert

The Detroit Free Press is being denied press and photo credentials for tonight's Kid Rock concert — the grand opening of the taxpayer-subsidized Little Caesars Arena — due to the performer's unhappiness with a newspaper column critical of the musician.

The decision, which was shared with the Detroit Free Press by Kid Rock's publicist, Kirt Webster, was made Monday afternoon and is a response to a column written by Free Press Editorial Page Editor Stephen Henderson that was critical of the decision to open the stadium with the controversial artist.

"You guys wrote a f****ed up story and allowed it to be published. You want a quote, there it is," Webster told the Free Press in a phone call this morning.

The newspaper routinely buys tickets to concerts, but the request for credentials allows reporters to bring in equipment necessary to file stories, such as laptops or cameras.

On Sunday, Sept. 3, Henderson published a column in which he called the decision to have Kid Rock open the arena a "middle finger to Detroiters."

Update:Free Press buys tickets to Kid Rock concert; here's the review

Read more

"This is a musician who got rich off crass cultural appropriation of black music, who used to wrap his brand in the Confederate flag — a symbol inextricably linked to racism, no matter what its defenders say — and who has repeatedly issued profane denouncements of the very idea of African Americans pushing back against American inequality," Henderson wrote, noting that his argument had nothing to do whether or not Kid Rock's music was "good" but rather the culture he represents — or what people, right or wrong, perceive him to represent.

While the article was an opinion piece and published as such, Webster said this was enough to bar the Free Press' news reporters from covering the historic opening.

"Jeff Taylor approved it and it was f***ed up," Webster continued, nodding to the fact that he heard that the column was approved by a regional editor who oversees the newspaper. "To be published without doing any fact checking on what Kid Rock has done for the city of Detroit? We don't condone bad behavior. We won't reward bad behavior."

Taylor said the decision was unfortunate.

"We’re disappointed by it," Taylor said. "Henderson’s column was an opinion piece, which is separate from news. We have covered the opening of the arena extensively and fairly in our news coverage, and from a variety of perspectives. We’ll continue to do that, factually and fairly, and to cover Kid Rock and the issues as well.”

Related:

The decision to deny the Free Press' request for press credentials comes hours after a fiery Facebook post by the musician about the "controversy" surrounding his performance.

In the statement, where Kid Rock called himself, "the bonified KING OF DETROIT LOVE," the artist said he would stop donating to organizations the failed to defend him from "unfounded attacks from these handful of jackasses and The Detroit Free Press." Later in the same post, the singer railed against the "fake news" media.

"I think the thing that reveals, I would say, Kid Rock's vantage point is his declaration of fake news," said Roy Peter Clark, senior scholar at the Poynter Institute, a nonprofit journalism school in St. Petersburg, Fla. "The accusation of fake news has become the right wing’s fall back position to anything they don't like to see in print."

This is not the first time Kid Rock has criticized the reporting of columnists at the Detroit Free Press. While the term "fake news" wasn't in existence yet, in 2012, the singer decried an article by Free Press columnist Susan Tompor, which found that much of his "Made in Detroit" clothing line not only was not made in Detroit but not made in the U.S.

"You didn’t care about printing the fact that 98 percent of all clothing sold in America is not made in America. It’s very difficult to even find quality and affordable USA made products, lord knows we have been looking from day one, not only for the MID brand but also for the Kid Rock merchandise we sell on tour," Kid Rock wrote in a 2012 response to the article, which he called a "hatchet job." Tompor's article, did in fact, point this out.

While the singer decried the Free Press in his blog post, the paper stood behind its reporting. The recent Henderson column, however, seems to have reignited ill-will.

When the Free Press reached out to Olympia Entertainment about getting press passes to film and photograph the crowd entering the arena, that request was denied as well. A reporter was told that when an artist is booked to play a venue, it's considered their building.

Officials from Live Nation, the concert's promoter, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Clark, from Poynters, pointed out that the denial of press credentials based on a column is particularly interesting as both the columnist and the artist benefit from First Amendment protections.

"Look, someone named Kid Rock, probably knows the history of rock and roll and the many attempts to ban and censor it in communities across America in 1950s and 60s — this was the devil’s music, or for some racists, it was negro music," said Clark. "So for this to come from someone like Kid Rock, who is one of the greatest beneficiaries of First Amendment protections — he obviously has the ability to say what he wants, whenever he wants to and can use the most colorful language, and it’s all protected."

Kid Rock's selection as the opening act for the new arena, with six consecutive shows starting Tuesday, has been under scrutiny by not just Henderson but several civil rights organizations, who have argued that Kid Rock has trafficked in performance stunts that could be viewed as an affront to African-American culture.

The singer, who hails from Romeo, began using the Confederate flag in shows in 2001. He publicly announced he was stopping the practice in 2011, after receiving an award from the NAACP. A music video that came out this summer for his song "Po-Dunk," however, showed a pregnant woman smoking a cigarette and wearing a T-shirt with the flag.

Little Caesars Arena has defended hiring Kid Rock for its shows.

“Kid Rock is the perfect entertainer to open Little Caesars Arena," Tom Wilson, president, and CEO of Olympia Entertainment, the sports and entertainment organization that oversees business operations for the Detroit Red Wings said in January when the performance was announced.

Last week at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new arena, Chris Ilitch, president, and CEO of Ilitch Holdings responded to the controversy about the arena's headliner.

"While I can't control what any artist does or says, I can guide our businesses to continue bringing life-changing opportunities to people in our community. I will always demand that our companies strive to do right by Detroit, our community, and its people," Ilitch said.

A week before Ilitch's statement, it had been announced that the singer wasn't just opening the stadium with six shows – he'd be a permanent fixture there, including a Kid Rock-themed restaurant.

Mayor Mike Duggan weighed in last week on Kid Rock opening the new arena saying, "He's an entertainer. My feeling is if you don't like Kid Rock's politics or music — don't go to the concert."