When the Openers All Walked
This week, Ed Sheeran's North American tour lost every one of its scheduled opening acts, in a rapid unraveling that pulled a billionaire NFL owner, a Grammy-winning rapper, and Sheeran himself into public dispute over free speech, antisemitism, and the war in Gaza. What began as one artist's onstage comments has, within days, cost Sheeran his entire supporting lineup for the rest of the tour.
One Exit Becomes Five
Earlier this month, opening for Sheeran at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, Macklemore called for a "free Palestine" onstage and performed "Hind's Hall," a protest song named for a 5-year-old Palestinian girl killed in Gaza. On Monday, he announced he'd been removed from the tour's remaining U.S. dates. Tour promoter Messina Touring Group said venues had indicated they would not host shows with Macklemore on the bill; New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft, who owns Gillette Stadium, publicly confirmed he'd opposed Macklemore's booking, citing what he described as the rapper's broader history of antisemitic rhetoric and imagery. Macklemore rejected that characterization, saying his advocacy was for Palestinians, not against Jewish people.
The following day, all four of Sheeran's remaining opening acts — producer Finneas, Irish singer Aaron Rowe, Danish band Lukas Graham, and Irish folk group Beoga — announced they were leaving the tour in solidarity, each citing support for Macklemore and for Palestinians. Sheeran, who had stayed largely silent on the Israel-Gaza war, addressed the fallout directly, saying the decision to remove Macklemore had been the promoter's and the venues', not his own, and that he'd held direct talks with activists on both sides trying to find a resolution — reportedly including an offer, relayed by Kraft, to commit $2 million toward Palestinian aid. That effort didn't hold. Meanwhile, the Israeli American Council had separately launched its own petition pushing in the opposite direction, demanding Macklemore's removal from the tour altogether — leaving Sheeran caught between two organized campaigns pulling in opposite directions.
Sheeran now heads into his remaining U.S. dates, including a show in Philadelphia this weekend, without a single supporting act, and with a South American leg still to come this winter. The dispute has, in a matter of days, turned one of the year's biggest pop tours into a referendum on where an artist's political speech ends and a promoter's business decisions begin — a question with no clean answer, and one that neither side of this particular fight seems ready to let go of quietly.