Singer-songwriter Mary J. Blige is reportedly facing $1 million worth of debt in back taxes.
Documents obtained by Bossip accuse the 48-year-old singer of failing to pay back taxes on the income she made in 2016 and 2017. Reports show the IRS filed a tax lien against Blige back in July, claiming the songstress owed Uncle Sam $1,198,161. According to Bossip, Blige has yet to respond to the filing.
The back tax issue seemingly stems from Blige’s history of financial problems. It was reported back in 2013 that Blige owed $3.4 million in unpaid income taxes over the span of three years. In addition, the singer was sued for defaulting on a couple of bank loans in late 2012 and early 2013. One of those incidents was for $2.2 million from Signature Bank and the other was for $500,000 from Bank of America.
In 2018, Apex Bank filed a lawsuit against Blige and her ex-husband, who doubled as her manager, Martin “Kendu” Isaacs, over unpaid mortgages for their property in Cresskill and Saddle River, New Jersey. However, Apex dropped the foreclosure case against the two back in May. In February of 2018, Blige sat down with Vulture for an interview, in which she discussed the issues she was dealing with financially. Blige explained that she never wanted to be a part of the money side of the business but admitted she had to once the lawsuits started to come in constantly.
“I’m just being straight-up honest. I never wanted to do all this stuff, but after what I’ve been through and all the mess that I’m in … You have to pay those taxes,” she said. “It’s good to see what you have and what you don’t have — and why are we paying this person $5,000 a week?” Blige is also currently paying $30,000 a month in spousal support to her ex Isaacs, who she called a “con-artist.” “I thought someone loved me, right? Turns out, he was a con artist and he didn’t, and now he’s coming after me for all my money,” she told Variety. “When you come out of something like that, you realize you were never the one. There was someone else that was his queen. I got played. I got suckered. I have to keep smiling and keep my spirits up because this is designed to kill me.”
But things have been looking up. Blige’s acting career is on full force with her newest role being in the Netflix series ”The Umbrella Academy,” as well as her upcoming role in ”Trolls” and collabs with Nas.
