KISS guitarist Gene Simmons is unabashedly pro-American and President Donald Trump. 

The two have known each other since before the first season of Trump’s competition show “Celebrity Apprentice” in 2008. In December 2025, Trump honored KISS with a Kennedy Center Honor medal. 

On July 4, Simmons will narrate a ceremony honoring World War II veterans for America’s 250th anniversary. Simmons said he is attending in honor of his mother, Flóra Klein, who survived a Nazi Germany concentration camp at the age of 14. The terror shaped the rest of Klein’s life, and Simmons’ as well. 

Simmons — who plays a sold-out show with his solo band on Saturday, Aug. 22, at Talking Stick Resort — said Klein was passionate about the United States and the opportunities it presents. Klein died in 2018; she was in her early 90s.

“Were it not for America’s brave men or women — I guess I should say ‘they/them’ to make sure everybody’s included — millions would have passed away,’ Simmons said.

“America sent its young men or women overseas at 18 or 19 years old knowing that many wouldn’t come back. We’re surrounded by two of the largest oceans on the planet. We have a huge land mass to the north and the south. How do I say this without sounding too patriotic, but I’m unapologetically patriotic. If it were not for this country, this planet would be a disaster. You and I would be speaking Japanese and German, although I can get by in German and speak a few Japanese words, of course.

“Now that their pants were beaten off, we’re the best friends, right?” 

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A childhood shaped by survival

When Simmons was 8, he watched late-night TV until it signed off for the night with the national anthem. Klein hushed him if he tried to speak over the “Star-Spangled Banner” backed by a rippling flag. Tears streamed down her face and Simmons thought she was sad. Years later, he realized she was grateful that America gave her a second chance at life. 

“It wasn’t until years later that I finally put the pieces together,” he said. “My mother was so full of joy and appreciation and love for this country because, not too many years earlier, she was in a concentration camp. She saw our whole family tortured, starved and gassed to death. 

“From her perspective, this is the promised land.”

Other people should feel that way, he added. The adage, “You don’t know what you have until it’s gone,” applies. 

“I hear, ‘I don’t like this president,’ ‘I’m leaving the country.’ Then they leave and they try to come back. We’ve had anywhere from 20 to 300 million illegal immigrants coming into America for a better life. They are willing to break the law. 

“That’s more people than there are in the vast majority of country populations on the planet. Did you know that? Why do they come here? I don’t hear anybody say, ‘Let’s go to Zimbabwe.’”

Following that American dream, he and KISS singer/guitarist Paul Stanley opened Rock & Brews restaurants in Wisconsin, Washington state, California (including one at LAX), Florida, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas.

“You can eat food that helps you watch your girlish figure,” he said. “Or you can eat monster burgers. If you have a hot tooth — there’s a sweet tooth, but you can have a hot tooth. I think I just made that up — you can try the Demon burger.”

The Demon burger features a brioche bun with fried chicken breast, Rockin’ hot sauce, pepper cheese spread, chipotle slaw, pickled red onions, fresh jalapeños and chipotle ranch.

Gene Simmons Band’s freedom

For decades, Simmons played the Demon — the fire‑breathing, tongue‑flicking, armor‑clad persona that helped make KISS one of the world’s biggest bands. 

Every so often, Simmons is asked, why he still performs. “I’ll ask Paul McCartney the same thing. ‘You’ve been in the Beatles and Wings, and you keep going out there and playing.’ Then I ask Springsteen, and Rod Stewart.

“The obvious answer is, ‘We love it.’ There’s a magic that happens on the stage or in the patois of the street for [the heck of it]. There’s a magic with the band and fans. 

“It’s tough to have a party by yourself. You can buy your Diet Coke and potato chips and put on music, but if you’re the only one in the room, that’s not much of a party. We’re social animals.” 

Gene Simmons Band was hastily formed when he was invited to play a Sao Paulo festival in front of 40,000. 

“I said, ‘Yeah sure” except I didn’t have a band then,” he said. “I had to put one together. It’s a killer band Every one of the guys sings and plays multiple instruments.

“We rehearsed a few days, went down there and had a ball. There’s no manager there. There are no road crews. We just show up, plug in and play. It’s so easy.”

That wouldn’t have been possible with KISS, which he called “a monster machine with 60 people, 20 tractor-trailers, three double- or triple-decker buses and 5 miles of electrical wiring. It was basically a moving city, if you will.”

That said, KISS couldn’t invite fans on stage. The musicians step in the wrong place and “you’re a shish kabob.” With the Gene Simmons Band, he pulls “kids on stage or chicks on stage” who want to sing. He hinted that these “kids” may be his own. 

The show’s format is sometimes improvised, as some audience members yell out requests like “Rocket Ride,” from 1978’s “KISS Alive: 2.” 

“We look at the guys and ask if they know it in the key of G flat,” Simmons added. “‘Who wants to sing it?’ It’s so much fun.”

The heart behind the dream

His legacy is the quiet engine behind his philanthropy. Simmons supports 1,200 children in Zambia, paying for their schooling and meals. He does it without fanfare, without press releases, without his name on a building. 

“Mostly anonymously, I don’t care about the erecting buildings or monuments,” he said.  His motivation is simple: someone once saved his mother’s life so, he feels he owes the world the same chance.

He also donates to veterans’ organizations, children’s hospitals and educational programs. He shows up for causes that align with his values, often without announcing it.

“The life you save might be the one who finds the cure to cancer or God knows what,” said Simmons, 74. “If you get a chance, you have to reach out and help the person next to you or far away.”

He speaks health, especially women’s health. When his wife, Shannon Tweed, developed a UTI that escalated into sepsis, Simmons skipped the Songwriters Hall of Fame ceremony in June to stay with her.

The experience was so harrowing that he urges women to get checked, to take symptoms seriously and to advocate for themselves. 

A life lived forward

Simmons is 74, but he’s not slowing down. The Gene Simmons Band performs in 40 cities this year, and he flies commercial by choice. He leaves via LAX, where he grabs a burger at the eatery he co-founded with KISS singer and guitarist Paul Stanley, Rock & Brews. He eschews the idea of retirement. He believes in purpose.

“And enjoy what? Sit on my thumb and watch the Malibu sunset day in and day out?” he said. “You got to have a reason to get up in the morning and do something.”