Kanye West slapped with Instagram ban after racist slur over Kim Kardashian ‘harassment'

Musician Kanye West has been temporarily locked out from his Instagram account for a day for violating the social media platform’s policies on hate speech, bullying and harassment.

Instagram deleted content posted by West, now known as Ye, and is restricting the account from posting, commenting and sending direct messages for a 24-hour period, Meta Platforms Inc. spokesman Joe Osborne said in a message late Wednesday. 

The rapper had earlier directed a racial slur at “The Daily Show” host Trevor Noah, after Noah expressed concern that West was harassing his former wife Kim Kardashian. Meta said it will take further steps against the account on additional violations.

West responded to Noah with an Instagram post where he replaced some of lyrics to the song “Kumbaya” with a racial slur against Black people. Representatives for West declined to comment to Variety on the matter.

In a monologue Tuesday, Noah said “I see a woman who wants to live her life without being harassed by an ex-boyfriend or an ex-husband,” before recounting his own mother’s experience of being shot in the head by his stepfather.

Instagram accounts can be banned after repeated violations of the rules, especially if multiple accounts report the bad behavior. Most user accounts can be banned automatically via artificial intelligence if there are enough reports, but a large verified account like West’s would be managed through Instagram’s partnerships team, which has close relationships with a number of celebrities.

Social media networks like Meta have at times struggled with moderating hateful content or harassment. Meta privately worried last year that the company wasn’t doing enough to take down hateful content. A whistleblower in October also said Meta knew about potential harm Instagram was causing to the mental health of young people, for which it recently added parental controls.