Elle King Discusses Relationship with Dad Rob Schneider on Podcast (Exclusive)

Elle King is aware of household could be sophisticated.

King lately opened up about her strained relationship with her father, comic Rob Schneider. On the Dumb Blonde podcast, the “Ex's & Oh's” singer instructed host Bunnie Xo that Schneider had despatched her to “fat camp” when she was a child, that he was absent and forgot her birthdays as a toddler and that she disagrees with his views on LGBTQ+ rights. After the podcast dropped, Schneider, 60, publicly apologized to King whereas talking with conservative media persona Tucker Carlson.

“I never in a million years thought that that was going to go viral. I was just speaking about my childhood and about my truth,” King, 35, tells PEOPLE. “I was not trying to hurt him.”

Despite the web chatter that got here with her feedback, King does not remorse talking her thoughts.

Rob Schneider and Elle King in an Instagram submit.

Rob Schneider/Instagram

“A lot of people said, ‘How could she say that about her family?' and ‘Everything needs to be behind closed doors.' No, it doesn't. Sometimes you have to just say things and get them off your chest so that you don't have to carry it for the rest of your life,” she says. “But ultimately, I think an apology on Tucker Carlson is like a double negative, right? Means nothing.”

And King is glad to have sparked conversations about allyship.

“What I will say is the best thing that came from that is that my incredible LGBTQ+ community knows that they have an ally in me,” she says. “And if that's the biggest thing to come out of that platform, then I would've done it 10 more f—ing times because I am an ally, they have one in me, and I'm grateful.”

King will launch her subsequent single, “High Road,” on Friday, Sept. 20.

Elle King's “High Road” single artwork.

Robby Klein

“Since last year, if anything was going wrong or something pissed me off, my manager would say, ‘High Road 2024,' and that was our theme of like, ‘Take the f—ing high road, bitch. Be the person that you would hope that you could be through any situation,'” the Grammy-nominated star says of the nation ballad's inspiration. “And it's just been a phrase that we've used.”

The “Drunk (and I Don't Want to Go Home)” singer was born in Los Angeles however was raised by her mother, model-turned-doula London King, and her stepdad Justin in Ohio.

“I was the chubby girl with a dad that didn't visit very often, and everybody made fun of me and were mean to me about it,” King instructed PEOPLE of her childhood in 2023.

King added that she was estranged from her dad for a time, and when she launched her 2012 self-titled EP, “he wasn't even in my life. He got married and had a kid, and we weren't even talking,” King says of Schneider, who shares daughters Miranda, 10, and Madeline, 6, with his third spouse Patricia.

Before their newest disagreement, King — who shares 3-year-old son Lucky with associate Daniel Tooker — instructed PEOPLE final yr she had reconnected with her dad, on her personal phrases: “My father and I have a beautiful and really wonderful, great loving relationship with awesome boundaries … I love my dad so much.”