Award-winning rapper Nicki Minaj has backed claims by US President Donald Trump that Christians are facing persecution in Nigeria.
On October 31, 2025, US President Donald Trump redesignated Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC), citing ongoing killings of Christians. Trump further warned that he would send troops into Nigeria “guns a-blazing” if the Nigerian government “continues to allow the killing of Christians.”
Nicki Minaj, whose real name is Onika Tanya Maraj-Petty, spoke at an event organised by the US embassy to the UN in New York on Tuesday, November 18, saying pointing out the protection of Christians in Nigeria was “not about taking sides or dividing people… but about uniting humanity.”
“In Nigeria, Christians are being targeted,” Minaj said, adding that: “Churches have been burned, families have been torn apart… simply because of how they pray.”
“This is about standing up in the face of injustice. It’s about what I’ve always stood for,” she went on.
The rapper thanked President Trump for “prioritising this issue and for his leadership.”
The US Congress will, on Thursday, November 20, hold a hearing on the persecution of Christians in Nigeria.
The office of Congressman Chris Smith, Chair of the U.S. Congressional Subcommittee on Africa, said the Thursday hearing will examine the “ongoing religious persecution of Christians by radical Islamists,” the wide-reaching implications of Trump’s re-designation of Nigeria as a CPC, and the course of action the US State Department should follow in response to the “Nigerian government’s complicity in these crimes.”
