Young Thug has been praised by his lawyer, Brian Steel, who called the rapper a “hero”.
Steel represented Thugger during his lengthy and controversial RICO trial with the two appearing to form a close bond.
Speaking in a brief social media clip, Steel, who later went on to counsel Diddy, said: “Since your trial, Jeffery, there are more acquittals than there were before your trial. It’s because it’s related back to the fact that you showed that the criminal justice system is corrupt and prosecutors, at times, hide evidence. You did that. You are a hero. Thank you for teaching everybody the truth.”
Earlier this year, Thug reflected on his decision to take a plea deal in his trial which saw him released from jail but facing a lengthy period of probation.
Brian Steel tells Young Thug that more people are beating their cases as a direct result of the YSL trial showing the world how prosecutors hide evidence pic.twitter.com/GxTxJb6xoz
— THUGGERDAILY ひ (@ThuggerDaily) August 2, 2025
In an interview with GQ, the rap superstar has been contemplating his decision to accept the plea and was asked if he found it difficult to make.
He replied: “Absolutely. Just pleading to something you know that you didn’t do is crazy. But you get a chance to keep fighting. [You can] worry about the jury’s fate, or you [can] just go ahead now and go home. It’s like shit. Go home.”
Thug also discussed what he was banned from rapping about due to the plea deal: “I can’t do nothing like gang things or stuff like that on the internet. I can really talk about what I want to talk about in music. I normally rap about cool things. I just got a few lyrics where I just rap about street stuff and those are the lyrics that they tried to use against me. But most of the time I don’t rap about that type of stuff.”
He also blasted the decision to ban him from visiting Atlanta as “abuse”.
If Thugger is ruled to have broken his probation, then he faces 20 years in prison.
Fans are still waiting for the Atlanta rapper to drop Uy Scuti, which would be his first album since his release from jail. He had originally promised it would be released by the end of June.
