Cardi B blasts UFC star who compared her to Andrew Tate and called her a 'brain dead moron'

• Former UFC fighter Jake Shields disparaged Cardi B in a tweet defending Andrew Tate.
• Cardi B responded in a now-deleted post and denied Shields' accusations about her.

Cardi B hit back at former UFC fighter Jake Shields after he compared her to Andrew Tate and disparaged her online.

The online tussle began on Thursday when Shields, 43, attempted to publicly defend Tate, 35, with a series of tweets. Tate made headlines in recent months after videos of his controversial comments about women began circulating on social media sites like TikTok and Instagram.

"People are freaking out about young boys looking up to Andrew Tate but totally fine with young girls looking up to Cardi B and the Kardashians," Shields wrote in one post.

He continued: "Tate's Main message is stop being lazy and making excuses and go work hard and get in shape and make money. Cardi's Is go do drugs, fuck random men and go through life as a brain dead Moron."

Cardi B, 29, responded to Shield's Twitter thread on Saturday in a now-deleted post. Entertainment blog The Neighborhood Talk shared screenshots of the exchange.

"I'm married, I don't smoke weed, I don't pop pills, I don't do coke," Cardi wrote. "I'm a mom of 2 kids and I do a lot of charity work … but hey let me put cardi into it to defend a man who defend misogyny and rape."

Representatives for Cardi B and Shields did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

On Thursday, Meta banned Tate from Facebook and Instagram for violating policies around dangerous organizations and individuals, as well as violating policies on hate speech. Tate is also banned from TikTok, with a spokesperson telling Insider that "misogyny is a hateful ideology that is not tolerated on TikTok."

In the past, Tate garnered backlash for saying rape victims need to "bear some responsibility" and suggested a woman's genitals belong to their partner when in a relationship. He also suggested that men and women are not equal, calling female self-defense "bullshit" and that women are "incapable of fighting."

Tate emerged as a new leading figure in the manosphere, which is "a network of online men's communities who promote anti-feminist and sexist beliefs blaming women and feminists for all sorts of problems in society," according to InternetMatters.org.

On Saturday, The Guardian reported that Tate's program — The Hustlers University — was closed. Some criticized the program, which offered financial advice through paid online courses, for appearing to be a scam.