Twitch streamer Kai Cenat's giveaway draws chaotic crowd to Union Square

Thousands of people overran a park and its surrounding area in New York City in a chaotic scene Friday afternoon ahead of an influencer’s giveaway of PlayStation 5 consoles, police said. No major injuries were immediately reported after authorities dispersed the crowd.

A post to Twitch streamer Kai Cenat’s Instagram story announced a giveaway at Union Square Park on Friday at 4 p.m. By 3 p.m., the giveaway went viral and thousands began arriving in Union Square, said Jeffrey Maddrey, the New York Police Department’s highest-ranking uniformed officer, at a news conference Friday.

The park was soon filled with people obstructing traffic as the crowd was seen taking down barriers and throwing objects at police. People also jumped on cars as unrest grew. Police “loaded up a city bus” with people under arrest, Maddrey said, but he didn’t have an exact count as of Friday evening.

“Due to police activity, avoid the area surrounding Union Square Park & use alternate routes,” the New York City Police Department said on X, formerly known as Twitter, at 3:48 p.m. “Expect a police presence in the area and residual traffic delays.”

Law enforcement eventually removed Cenat from the park, Maddrey said, “for safety reasons.” He added that authorities are mulling legal action, including charging Cenat with “inciting a riot,” though it was not yet clear what they would do. The event was not pre-coordinated with police, the chief added.

“This speaks to the power of social media,” Maddrey said, describing the speed with which thousands gathered in the Manhattan park after seeing the giveaway announced online just hours earlier.

Cenat has six-and-a-half million followers on Twitch and holds the record for most monthly subscribers on the platform, with more than 300,000 paying viewers in February. That’s more paying subscribers than most U.S. newspapers.

Friday’s giveaway was a collaboration with Bronx YouTube star Fanum, who discovered and elevated Cenat’s career in content creation. Cenat’s star grew as he streamed with rappers like 21 Savage and Bobby Shmurda. Cenat has earned tens of thousands of dollars a month just for streams of himself sleeping.

Twitch has banned Cenat several times since 2021 for various infractions, including displaying explicit imagery, threatening other users and streaming while under the influence.

During a short stream inside a vehicle near Union Square on Friday, Cenat flashed a fistful of what he said were $100 gift cards stored in a brown CVS paper bag to give away.

“They’re throwing tear gas out there,” said Cenat in a Twitch stream while the chaos was unfolding. “We’re not going to do nothing until it’s safe … everybody for themselves, because it’s a war out there man.”

Seconds later, Cenat departed the vehicle and was immediately swarmed by fans. The stream cut out shortly after Cenat’s bodyguards began pushing people away from him.

Maddrey said people in the park threw paint cans, bottles and rocks, while others walked around with shovels, axes and other tools from nearby construction sites. Some in the crowd, the police chief added, lit fireworks during the chaos and one or two police officers had to be removed from the crowd because of injuries.

By around 5 p.m., police, some on horseback, were dispersing the crowd. As it grew closer to 6 p.m., police had pushed much of the crowd well out of the park.