Last year, Sean "Diddy" Combs was sentenced to 50 months in prison for two counts interstate transportation related to prostitution. After an extremely publicized sex-trafficking trial, a jury found Combs not guilty of the most serious charges against him, and he's now trying to appeal his current sentence. Whether or not they were proven in court, the many allegations against Combs paint an extremely troubling picture. So it's notable when a superstar on the level of Usher goes out of his way to defend the man.
As TMZ points out, Usher made his recent comments about Diddy in a Forbes interview with Jabari Young. Here's what Usher said in that interview:
In many ways, I think certain people are prosecuted and maybe not recognized for the greatness that they offer. I don't have anything negative to say about Sean Combs because my experience was not what the world has seen, in how he's been misrepresented.
I'm not saying that every man is perfect. I'm not saying that all of us don't have flaws. But I can't, with any sense of humanity, not recognize the valuable contributions that this man made for us as Black entrepreneurs, for us as businessmen, for us as people who transition culture and ideas into something that's tangible and becomes business. So many people have benefited from what he created, and I acknowledge that. And that's why I see him as legacy...
Puff was a mentor, but you know when you had that really, really hard teacher? But you're watching something in real time. I think that the idea of the level of discipline that came with that time in business, especially in an era that was trying to prove itself culturally in hip-hop. Now, you can't turn on the television and not see hip-hop. But the people who actually made that appropriate and are the forefathers are people like Sean Combs — and not just in the great times that they had musically, but in the idea of being able to find ways to monetize culture and create something that was not just Black or white. It was colorless. It was green.
That's what I see that man as, and that's what I choose to remember. I put respect on his name because I realize that what I learned as a businessman before I even understood what business was came as a result of seeing the incredible things that he was able to do and the way that he positioned himself as a businessman. There are trials and tribulations that come with the pressure of success and power, but what we choose to do with it is what I hope that you see with me and hopefully with all the people that I'm involved with.
— . (@mediasplus_) March 25, 2026
Through TMZ, Combs offers this response: "I’ve always had love and respect for Usher. I appreciate his words and everything he’s achieved."
Usher is a very charming person with an amazing, melodious speaking voice. He can be very convincing on charm alone. But what he's attempting here is some absolutely detestable reputation-laundering. The positives that Usher claims Combs brought into the world, the way he sees it, were in Combs' ability to "monetize culture." By implication, he seems to blame Combs' abuses on "trials and tribulations that come with the pressure of success and power." It's evil shit, and it will have a far greater impact on the way that I see Usher than on the way that I see Combs.
When Usher was coming up as an R&B child star, Combs served as an early mentor. LA Reid, the executive who signed Usher, sent the 15-year-old singer to New York to shadow Combs and learn how to project swagger. Years later, Usher told Rolling Stone, "Puff introduced me to a totally different set of shit — sex, specifically. Sex is so hot in the industry, man… There was always girls around. You'd open a door and see somebody doing it, or several people in a room having an orgy. You never knew what was going to happen." Usher and Combs went on to collaborate many times over the years.
In other news, Usher seemingly denies reports that he's currently feuding with Justin Bieber, an artist who was once Usher's own teenage protege. Last week, TMZ reported that Usher and Bieber got into an "intense altercation" at Beyoncé and Jay-Z's Oscars after-party. A source told TMZ that the confrontation never got physical but that Bieber is trying to bury the story and that he has "always been rude" to Usher.
Usher hasn't directly addressed those reports, but his denials are still getting out there. As Page Six reports, Usher's friend Da Brat recently appeared on The Rickey Smiley Show and addressed the story. She said:
I spoke to Usher, and he said this is an exaggeration of conversation. He's been nothing but supportive of plenty of issues that Justin Bieber has had throughout the years, and y'all can actually check the records for all that he has done. Justin is on his own journey, dealing with his own reality that he's created. Usher wishes him nothing but the best, and they have no hostility towards each other.
They definitely love each other. People just take things out of context when they see something, and they run with it. And I'm just here to say that is not the issue. They are definitely cool with each other, and they have love, and they support each other...
I mean, they had a conversation. Nobody heard the conversation, but the two of them, people just take it and twist it and turn it around. But I'm letting you know that everything is OK between them and there is no hostility.
