Did Cardi B Just Quietly Reignite Her Beef With Nicki Minaj? Black Twitter Has Theories

Another week, another rap beef? According to internet sleuths, this seems to be the case between Cardi B. and Nicki Minaj.

Their reasoning stems from the latest maternity photos posted by Cardi to Instagram over the Labor Day holiday weekend. As previously reported by The Root, in August, the “Bongos” rapper announced she was expecting her third child with her soon-to-be ex-husband Offset.

Posing in a long leather motorcycle jacket, leather bustier and leather boots, the Cardi sits atop of a motorcycle with a graffiti’d wall in the background as well as a sonogram photo. Now, how does Nicki fit into all of this...?

Keen-eyed fans noticed the word “pedophile” spray-painted over the word “homesick in the background.” As you may remember, Nicki’s husband Kenneth Petty is a registered sex offender who was convicted of first-degree attempted rape in 1995.

As the pictures began to circulate online, some fans took to X/Twitter to speculate and stoke the flames between the two artists once again. (The two have been reportedly beefing off and on since 2017.)

“Yall gotta read the whole thing: HOMESICK PEDOPHILE. This can go 2 ways. Either she’s talking Nicki being both an immigrant & grooming Lil Twist OR it can be Kenneth who dated an underage Onika then moved out CA still moving like a rat in NY. Oh Cardi,” wrote one user.

“Nicki Minaj and her husband being the first thing yall think of when yall see the word “pedohile” is very telling… idk,” said another.

“I don’t even understand making that pedophile Cardi b maternity pic a moment to shade Nicki. Like no. Take Nicki out and it’s weird regardless. She’s literally wearing the brand that promoted child sexuality. These celebs are very nasty and perverted! They show us constantly,” another wrote.

It didn’t take too long for the “Up” rapper to get wind of it and shut things down.

“First of all we literally picked a random street because paparazzi was hounding us everywhere,” she wrote in a tweet on Monday. “This was supposed to be my original first picture and we had to edit the photos in minutes because the shoot got leaked. Didn’t even have time to go over every detail because people were busy trying to expose my pregnancy as ‘aha’ moment…Second I’m ALWAYS with the shits but I’m not using MY MATERNITY shoot to be funny. Are you dumb??

In a followup tweet, she explained that her makeup artist was the one who ended up editing the photos, no one paid attention to the graffiti on the wall, and that if she really wanted to take shots at the “Chun-Li” rapper, she would’ve done so a week prior.

“I KEEP TELLIN YALL TO LEAVE ME THE FUK ALONE !! If I’m saying I’m not on that time DONT MAKE ME GET ON THAT TIME. Unrist yourself!!” she said.