Killer Mike Calls 2024 Grammy Awards Battery Arrest a ‘Speed Bump’ on His Historic Night

Killer Mike has finally spoken out about his strange night at Sunday’s (Feb. 4) 66th annual Grammy Awards. The 48-year-old rapper born Michael Santiago Render was detained at L.A.’s Crypto.com Arena just before the kick-off of the prime-time broadcast after winning three top hip-hop prizes during the Grammys Premiere Ceremony before the televised program.

Appearing on V103’s Big Tigger Morning Show on Monday morning (Feb. 5), Mike, who said he’d been up all night at parties, appeared to downplay the incident when host Tigger asked “what happened” on Sunday night. “I won a Grammy,” Mike said. “We party all night. Shout out to my record label. Ain’t nothing had happened, man. But we winners. That’s it.”

Tigger attempted to approach the question from a different angle, asking why Mike left the Grammys and came back. “Didn’t I look good? I was fresh. All black man,” Mike answered, focusing on his outfit, the car he drove up in and the $400K Cuban link necklace he was rocking in lieu of addressing the details of the arrest. “Then I went and picked up all the gold… We hit a speed bump and then we hit back to the party,” Mike said in the only seeming reference to his arrest.

After scooping up best rap song and best rap performance for “Scientists & Engineers” and best rap album for his solo effort Michael, Mike was detained on a misdemeanor charge. In a late night tweet, the LAPD public information office issued a statement on the arrest, writing, “On Sunday February 4th just after 4pm a male adult was detained & handcuffed for a physical altercation that occurred at the 700 block of Chick Hearn Court. The suspect was placed under arrest and was transported to LAPD Central Division.”

In an email to Billboard on Monday morning (Feb. 5), a spokesperson for the LAPD confirmed that the suspect named in Sunday tweet was Render, who was booked for misdemeanor battery and released on no bail. At press time spokespeople for the rapper and the Recording Academy had not returned Billboard‘s request for further comment and no additional information was available on the incident that precipitated the arrest.

When co-host Jazzy asked if being “carried out or being arrested” overshadowed the three wins, Mike was again adamant that it did not spoil his big night. “I wasn’t carried outta nowhere. I didn’t carry… we not even gonna allow you to ask that question,” Mike said, noting that an artist out of Atlanta won best rap album for an LP released during the year when hip-hop was celebrating its 50th anniversary.

Listen to the interview below.