Lady Gaga’s Dad Dragged After Asking for Public Donations to Pay His Restaurant Employees
Lady Gaga's dad is under fire for asking for donations to pay his restaurant staff amid the coronavirus pandemic.
This weekend, Joe Germanotta created a GoFundMe campaign asking the public to help him raise $50,000 to cover his staff's salaries at his New York restaurant Joanne Trattoria, which is being shut for due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
“I’m doing the best I can but we had to close Joanne for the month. Our staff needs some help financial [sic]. Any help for our employees will be appreciated,” he wrote in a since-deleted tweet per Newsweek.
His request was immediately met with criticism from people who pointed out that he could just ask his Oscar-winning daughter to help him. After all, she's worth an estimated $275 million and according to Forbes, she earned $39.5 million in 2019.
Blogger Perez Hilton was among the many who called Germanotta out via Twitter.
"Lady Gaga is worth hundreds of millions of dollars AND is part owner in her family’s restaurant. Yet her also wealthy father has just taken to Twitter to ask the public to help financially [sic] the workers they have stopped paying. What the f--k????" he wrote.
Gaga has not responded to her dad's controversy, but his GoFundMe account was deactivated shortly after he received backlash. The campaign raised $541 before it was shut down.
Meanwhile, the pop star, who announced she's postponing the release of her new album Chromatica, announced on Instagram March 16 that her beauty line, Haus Labs, is donating money to help those affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.