Ludacris News

(2/15/03, 10 a.m. ET) -- Earlier this week it was announced that Russell Simmons and the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network (HHSAN) had reached a tentative agreement with Pepsi to avoid a boycott of Pepsi products, which would have taken place as part of the Campaign For Respect. However, the boycott seemed imminent on Thursday morning (February 13) following statements made by Fox News personality Bill O'Reilly on his show Wednesday night (February 12).

Simmons explained the new turn of events at the Sheraton Hotel in Midtown Manhattan on Thursday afternoon. "Thirty minutes ago, we were given a signed agreement from president of Pepsi Cola, Dawn Hudson, and it announces the partnership between the Pepsi Cola Company and the Ludacris Foundation," Simmons said. "Last night on O'Reilly--as maybe some of you know, but I'm sure it was passed around the hip-hop community, certainly--there was a statement made that Ludacris was not part of our agreement."

Last week Simmons and HHSAN demanded a public apology to Ludacris and the hip-hop community, a $5 million charitable contribution to the Ludacris Foundation in Atlanta, and the re-airing of the Ludacris Pepsi commercials that were pulled.

The final accord reached between the two parties calls for Pepsi to make an annual contribution of $1 million to the Ludacris Foundation for three years. In addition, the HHSAN will help Pepsi find other community-based organizations to support. Simmons made it clear that he would not accept any money for any charitable organization that he is involved in.

While Pepsi offered to shoot a new series of ads on hip-hop history with Ludacris, the rapper declined and additionally stated through Simmons that he did not want his previous ads to re-air.

The controversy between Ludacris and Pepsi began in August of 2002, when Pepsi pulled a national, 30-second commercial featuring multiplatinum rapper from the air after Fox's O'Reilly called for a boycott of the soft drink company. O'Reilly characterized Pepsi as "immoral" for using the rapper, whom he described as a "rap thug." O'Reilly referenced several of the Ludacris's lyrics, which he said emphasized a lifestyle that included getting intoxicated, selling drugs, fighting people, and degrading women.

The issue resurfaced when Pepsi began to run ads with the Osbournes, a move that Simmons categorized as racially insensitive. The company maintained that Ludacris was inappropriate spokesman because of his usage of language, but Simmons and the HHSAN contended that the Osbournes use of language was just as unacceptable.

-- Yves Erwin Salomon, New York

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