Kick co-founder addresses rumor they signed Hawk Tuah girl to $5M contract

Kick co-founder Ed Craven has addressed rumors that the platform signed the Hawk Tuah girl to a $5 million contract.

Ed Craven has shut down the viral rumors that Kick has signed deals with ‘Hawk Tuah’ girl Hailey Welch and controversial comedian Charleston White.

On October 11, Twitter user TheKickJoker shared a post alleging that the streaming platform offered a $2 million deal to Charleston, who was arrested in 2023 on animal cruelty charges and again on October 10 for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

“We are in the arc of partnering convicts and felons…. I hope sources got this wrong,” the user wrote. “First, the dude in the boat, now this guy?”

It didn’t take long for Ed to debunk this claim, replying: “Kick hasn’t issued new deals in a while, as we’ve moved to the KCIP model. This model gives qualified individuals the opportunity to apply, with larger audiences sometimes being fast tracked.”

He continued: “Anything else you’ve heard is mostly noise, clickbait, or third parties offering their own ‘deals’ independently. I mentioned this shift a while back, and it’s been a huge success.

“Kick is performing better across nearly every KPI, but more importantly, we’re focused on fostering a healthier, stronger community of motivated individuals and rewarding them fairly.”

Shortly after replying to the post, another user alleged that Ed is signing the Hawk Tuah girl to a $5 million contract, claiming that she would bring “nothing” to the streaming platform.

But the Kick co-founder quickly denied this, stating: “This is not true.”

The rumor started on October 11, when KickStreamsLive, a Twitter account with over 128.5K followers, claimed that Hailey signed a $5 million deal with the streaming platform. Although there’s no cited source, many people took this as a fact.

This speculation follows the social media star’s debut on Kick on October 5, where she live-streamed her ‘Meet and Greet’ at Dreamhack Atlanta.