Instead of showering their father Russell Simmons with gifts on Father’s Day, the music mogul’s daughters, Ming Lee and Aoki Lee, celebrated their mother Kimora Lee Simmons.
“Happy Father’s Day,” Ming Lee, 23, wrote in an Instagram story on Sunday, June 18. the post office.
After his daughter’s search, Simmons, 65, took to Instagram to blame his ex-wife for the family tension.
“Stop telling dads they should have fought harder to see their kids and start asking moms why he had to fight,” Simmons wrote in a since-deleted Instagram story, according to Page 6.
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Aoki Lee, 20, who just graduated from Harvard, responded to Simmons’ post on Monday by sharing past text exchanges with his father and a muted video call where he appeared to be angry.
“My dad has been unwell for years he has needed help and won’t accept that he refuses to acknowledge that he is not himself,” she captioned the FaceTime video. posted on Instagram.
“He threatened and intimidated my sister, my grandmother, he harassed my grandmother in the middle of the night in poor health, [and sent] a man at my sister’s apartment at 2 a.m. to scare her. He goes after ANYONE who doesn’t say, “Ooh Russell, it’s okay.” Well, that’s not right,” she added.
Kimora, 48, responded to Simmons with a statement on her Instagram story on Monday, saying she couldn’t keep quiet any longer.
“I’m so sorry to have to do this,” she wrote. “But this man is threatening the lives of my children. I hear so much more now. We will not be intimidated, threatened or frightened.
She added in a second slide: “Leave my kids alone. This narrative of attacking the sole caregiver, the sole parent at home with the children, the mother AND the children for their own shortcomings and embarrassments is dead. Dead. Dead.”
Kimora then accused Simmons of having a history of “violence” against women.
“The same abusive ish,” she wrote. “That’s how we maneuver [sic] with the women around you. Your threats and lies and intimidation maneuvers [sic] and the tactic is sad. Stop, please. Your own flesh and blood? Enough is enough.”
Kimora also posted a video and said his daughters haven’t been close with their father for some time, but he continues to suggest on social media that he has a great relationship with his children.
In his video, which The shadow room captured, Kimora said family tensions escalated “over the past few months” when Simmons “cut off” her daughters financially.
“He was contributing a little cash towards their monthly college expenses, not a lot, maybe a few hundred dollars,” she said, adding that she had “receipts” to back up her claims.
Multiple media outlets reached out to Simmons for comment, but he had not responded Monday night.