'We made a spiritual pact': Azealia Banks reveals her side of the story behind the amulet she reportedly made with Jack Dorsey's beard hair to protect the Twitter CEO from ISIS

AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey reportedly had an amulet made from his beard hair by the rapper Azealia Banks.

• Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey reportedly had rapper Azealia Banks make an amulet from his beard hair in 2016 after he received threats from ISIS.
• Banks told Business Insider on Monday that the story - which has recently been recirculating - is "absolutely" true and that she still has one of the strands of Dorsey's hair.
• According to Banks, she expected Dorsey to tweet about her mixtape in exchange for the amulet and her mention of Square on Twitter, which she did in a tweet posted in March 2015.
• "I made a pact on his behalf and he left me hanging," Banks said. "He will pay for that."

An old story about rapper Azealia Banks making an amulet for Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey from his beard hair is making the rounds. And, Banks tells Business Insider the anecdote is completely true.

Back in 2016, Banks posted on her since-deleted Twitter account that Dorsey had "sent me his hair in an envelope because i was supposed to make him an amulet for protection."

The tweet was accompanied by a photo that appears to show feathers and blood in a small jar.

The anecdote resurfaced in a recent Vanity Fair article about Dorsey.

"Once, a source who worked with him told me Dorsey had sent a rapper his beard shavings to make him an amulet that would protect him from evildoers," Nick Bolton reported.

Read more: Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is facing backlash for encouraging people to visit Myanmar, where social media may have helped fuel a mass genocide

Business Insider reached out to Banks via Instagram DM on Monday to get her side of the story - which she says "absolutely" happened, though she used strands of his hair as opposed to shavings. According to Banks, she still has one of the strands of Dorsey's beard hair in an envelope in her storage space.

As Banks recalls, Dorsey followed her on Twitter a few years ago. The two texted frequently and once met up in person, she said.

"We have this awkward dinner of turkey slices, asparagus, and tomato as he is on something called the Bulletproof Diet ... the food was nasty, so I had some drinks and we kept talking," Banks says.

Soon after the dinner, Banks says that she offered to do a protection spell on Dorsey after he was threatened by ISIS in a propaganda video. In exchange for the spell - which Banks says required some of Dorsey's hair - and tweeting about Dorsey's company Square, she says she asked him to tweet a link to her Slay-Z mixtape when it was released.

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Azealia Banks.

However, Dorsey did not tweet a link to the mixtape when it was released in March 2016. In April 2016, Banks tweeted that Dorsey had failed to live up to his side of the deal.

"A lot of articles said I put a hex on him but I didn't," Banks said. "I have no reason to wish him harm. But we made a spiritual pact and he was supposed to make good on his end."

Banks' Twitter account was deleted in 2018 after she graphically insulted Monet X Change, a contestant on "RuPaul's Drag Race." The rapper says she believes that she was further targeted by Twitter for her formerly pro-Trump views.

According to Banks, she and Dorsey have not been in contact in recent years.

In 2018, Banks was linked to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, as she said she was staying at one of the executive's Los Angeles properties soon after he tweeted that funding was "secured" to take Tesla private. Banks told Business Insider she saw Musk "scrounging for investors" when she stayed at his house, despite the CEO claiming at the time he had secured funding to take Tesla private.

Read more: Azealia Banks reveals why she thinks Elon Musk was right to settle with the SEC and who Tesla should tap as its new chairman

Banks feels many people - including Dorsey - have misunderstood or misrepresented her interactions with the Twitter CEO. Twitter did not respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

"He may think that my religion is a facet of mental illness but it isn't," Banks said. "It's a well-established African traditional religion which should be respected."

"I made a pact on his behalf and he left me hanging. He will pay for that."