Federal contracting records show a $150,520 award for a Vanilla Ice performance at an event during Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s India trip last month, which the State Department later zeroed out, The Washington Sun reports.
The Sun says the U.S. consulate in Mumbai listed a contract on Oct. 18 with the booking firm Universal Attractions for the rapper, whose real name is Robert Van Winkle, to play a Freedom 250 event. According to a USAspending ledger the Sun cites, the award was zeroed out on Oct. 22.
Rubio and Ambassador Sergio Gor had attended a Freedom 250 reception on Oct. 20. Vanilla Ice never performed.
A State Department spokesperson told the Sun the embassy had weighed hiring him but opted against it, adding that entertainment at these events receives “no U.S. taxpayer funding or subsidies.” The Sun says the spokesperson declined to say where payment would have come from.
Contracting records list the department’s Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs as the funding office.
Freedom 250 is a Trump administration public-private partnership that is distinct from, and has overshadowed, the bipartisan nonprofit America250, which was originally authorized by Congress to put on anniversary celebrations for the founding of the United States. Vanilla Ice was one of nine acts slated to play Freedom 250 events on the National Mall this summer, and he stayed on after seven others withdrew.
His National Mall set was ultimately canceled, the report noted, with “inclement weather” given as the reason.
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