Ona chilly night in November, radio personality Charlamagne Tha God is roaming through the aisles of Midtown Comics in New York City, captivated by the heroes and villains that shaped his childhood. “Escapism at the highest level,” he says. “Everybody's here for a purpose.” Dressed in a black peacoat, a white hoodie, black jeans, and tan Timberland boots, this isn’t the media vigilante that listeners of The Breakfast Club have come to expect over the past 15 years.

The 47-year-old comic book nerd leafing through original graphic novels of Batman, Superman, Wolverine, and one of his favorites, Luke Cage, is more subdued and introspective as he considers his public and private personas.

"I’m like Smart Hulk," Charlamagne tells Forbes. "When Bruce Banner learns how to combine himself with The Incredible Hulk, he's Smart Hulk. I'm Lenard McKelvey," he adds, using his real name, emphasizing the second syllable of his first name. "Charlamagne is now an extension of that."

But Charlamagne is the name the world has come to know over the past few decades, beginning as a radio intern at Z93 in Charleston, South Carolina, and continuing through his time with radio host Wendy Williams before joining the syndicated Breakfast Club show in 2010, alongside DJ Envy and Angela Yee. Across more than 100 stations on the iHeartMedia network, he can be equal parts trash talker, voice for the voiceless, and an advocate for mental health—a balance, as he likes to say, of "ratchetness and righteousness.”

In other words, he’s not afraid to go there.

Charlamagne has railed against corporate DEI, calling it “well-intentioned” but “mostly garbage.” And among the celebrities who have been named “Donkey of the Day” on The Breakfast Club are Diddy (“con artist”), Nicki Minaj (“stank and nasty”) and Post Malone (“not my cup of mayonnaise”).

He’s also an equal opportunity offender when it comes to politics. After House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries referred to him as “Charlatan the Fraud,” he responded by taunting Jeffries as “Chuck E. Cheese Obama.” And while he called for Joe Biden to drop out of the presidential race several months before he actually did, he also frequently refers to President Trump a “fascist,” which led the Insulter in Chief to refer to Charlamagne as a “racist sleazebag.”

“No fear,” Jon Stewart says of Charlamagne, who has been a guest on The Daily Show for years and once guest-hosted. "He has an incredible ability to distill conversation to its salient center. And it's not a contrivance for clicks— it's real."

Adds Bob Pittman, Chairman and CEO of iHeartMedia: “Does he say stuff that a lot of people don't agree with? Of course. But that's Charlamagne being true to Charlamagne.”

And he has been consistently rewarded for that outrageousness. In August, Charlamagne signed a five-year, $200 million extension with iHeartMedia. The deal keeps Charlamagne on The Breakfast Club for the near future and puts him in the same league with Joe Rogan, who signed a multiyear extension with Spotify for a reported $250 million last year.

Locking in Charlamagne is vital to iHeartMedia, which

© Forbes