SZA Defends Beyoncé After House Republican Dismisses Her Historic Grammy Wins as 'DEI'

SZA has Beyoncé's back and has made her support for the singer known amid a Congressman making headlines for attributing Beyoncé's historic Grammy Awards wins for her Cowboy Carter album to "DEI."

In a repost to her Instagram Stories on Feb. 10, SZA hit back at the allegations that Beyoncé's Grammy wins were from anything other than her talent, hard work and determination.

"If Beyoncé spent time in the comments defending her right to sing country, or any other music, she would have never became Beyoncé," the post began.

The next part of the post included a quote from iconic writer Toni Morrison that read: "The very serious function of racism is distraction."

The post also noted that Beyoncé got to work after her 2016 CMAs performance that was met with a less-than warm welcome instead of being "online in the comments" and shared how Queen Bey went on to make history as the first Black person to win Country Album of the Year.

"Never forget that when excellence steps into the room mediocrity gets paranoid. Focus and keep going!" SZA's post ends.

SZA's repost comes after a GOP Congressman Burgess Owens slammed Beyoncé for her Grammys triumph. He referred to the wins as "the closest thing to DEI we're going to see right now."

"You put all that hard work [in], develop your fan base. You go out and you work to develop a reputation and all of a sudden somebody comes out of the blue, because she's popular in something else, and she is the best. Nobody respects that. And unfortunately, because of that, Beyoncé will not be respected by that core group of people that she's now singing to," Owens added.

The Congressman then added that he believes that the award actually hurts Beyoncé more than it helps her.

"I think it diminishes her. I think it diminishes the awards. And I think you have a lot less people watching as time goes on. Fairness is what our country is all about," he shared.

After Queen Bey took home the Best Country Album award as well as her very first Album of the Year Award at the 2025 Grammy Awards on Feb. 2, many country artists such as John Rich and Dylan Scott slammed the win.

Rich tweeted serval posts, including one where he shared that Lainey Wilson, who was nominated alongside Beyoncé in the Best Country Album category, was better than her. Another post slammed award shows, claiming that they have "zero to do with who made the best music."

Scott shamed the win as "manipulation" and that fans should be the ones to vote and decide who wins in these categories.

"Time to let the fans vote! Award shows have become fake and what the narrative is. The fans are the ONLY thing that's real. So instead of a 'board' of industry people voting and manipulating the system, leave it to the fans," he said per Holler.

Despite all of the pushback from country music fans and members of the community, one Grammy member hit back. Novelist Stuart Rojstaczer shared his take on Queen Bey's Grammy win, expressing that he thought in this case DEI was used "in a positive way."

"Grammy voters have had an attitude about music that is identical to Trump and the GOP have about people in the workplace: white people do it better. Sad but true. That's been reflected in the voting year after year, except this year. This year was the first year that Grammy voters actually embraced DEI. Yeah I'll use the DEI word in a positive way. Beyoncé voted for album of the year reflects that. She should have won years ago," he says in the clip.

Cowboy Carter marked a significant departure from Beyoncé's previous work, delving into country music and highlighting its Black origins. The album's lead single, "Texas Hold 'Em," debuted at number one on the Hot Country Songs chart, making Beyoncé the first Black woman to achieve this feat.

Tags

SZA, Beyonce, Beyonce Knowles