Todrick Hall shot back at Demi Lovato after she said he was wrong to call high-powered music executive Scooter Braun “homophobic.”
Hall, who used to be represented by Braun, told BuzzFeed News’ AM to DM he didn’t think it was Lovato’s place to discount his own feelings about working with the mogul.
“She just recently came out as queer, which, I’m very proud of her, but you can’t compare your experience to someone else’s experience ever, I don’t think,” he said.
Hall, who will soon be starring in Waitress on Broadway, said he thinks Braun’s team likely asked Lovato to write the Instagram posts defending Braun. He said he couldn’t prove it, but his experience working with Braun made him believe that.
He said he felt “it was very odd that she would comment on my Instagram.”
The disagreement between the two performers began in July after news broke that Braun was buying Big Machine Label Group, a purchase that included the master recordings of Taylor Swift’s first six albums. Braun will now earn royalties off of her work.
Swift responded to the news in a Tumblr post, claiming that Braun had bullied her online and saying that his ownership of her work was a “worst case scenario.”
The post sparked a war of words online with celebrities like Hall and Lovato coming out in support of one side or the other in social media posts. Lovato’s team declined to comment on the interview. A representative for Braun didn’t return a request for comment.
Hall, who is close friends with Swift, posted about the purchase on Twitter and Instagram, writing that “Scooter Braun is evil, evil, EVIL.”
Lovato, who began working with Braun in May, responded to Hall’s post directly in a comment that has since been deleted, saying, “Hey boo idk you or anything and this isn’t hate, but making claims that someone is homophobic is really serious.”
“Please don’t spread information that isn’t true because I can guarantee you Scooter isn’t,” Lovato continued. “As a member of the LGBTQ+ community myself, he wouldn’t have signed me if he was.”
Hall stood his ground Friday, saying that just because Lovato has not experienced anti-gay sentiment doesn’t mean he didn’t.
Hall said he felt Braun had discriminated against him by failing to take his musical aspirations seriously.
“Racism is just the belief that your race is superior to another race. It doesn’t mean that you don’t have friends or employees that are of another race. It just means that at the end of the day you believe that your race is superior. And, I think the same thing with homophobia,” Hall said.
Hall said Braun’s views were evident in the people he chooses to represent, and the way he supports their careers.
“He doesn’t have a lot of people of color — and, if he usually represents them, they are usually people that are already at an established level in their career — and he doesn’t have a lot of people in the queer community,” said Hall.
He added that he felt his sexual orientation and race were “a handicap for me” while working with Braun. Hall said that representation of queer artists is especially important right now, and said that people like Braun who have so much power should make a point of supporting their careers.
“The world is in a place right now where we need people like Sam Smith, like Troye Sivan — we need huge artists out there to represent the gay community,” said Hall. “And I think that when you have so much power and you’re at the top of your game and you have nothing to lose, it wouldn’t hurt you to go out and try to push someone.”
Despite the disagreement and his dislike of Braun, Hall said he still supports Lovato.
“I still love her, and I will be buying all of her albums and singing ‘Sorry Not Sorry’ till the day I die,” he said.