Make America Ye Again? Nope!
Kanye West’s forays into politics have always been amusingly baffling at best, downright insane the rest of the time. He ticked off a lot of Republicans in 2005 when he went on national TV after a natural disaster and said, “George Bush doesn’t care about black people.” He won back a lot of those same Republicans when he started wearing a MAGA hat, even chewing out the staff of SNL on live TV for telling him to take it off. Nobody knows what Kanye will do next, least of all Kanye.
Most recently, he confused pretty much everybody with this July Fourth announcement:
We must now realize the promise of America by trusting God, unifying our vision and building our future. I am running for president of the United States 🇺🇸! #2020VISION
— ye (@kanyewest) July 5, 2020
#Kanye2020? Sure, why not?
Love him and/or hate him, Kanye is never boring. Just as all the Dems stopped fighting the inevitable and made way for a 77-year-old man, just as the grim reality of the upcoming presidential election was starting to set in, Kanye gave us a reprieve. Sure, he’ll never win in a million years, but at least it’s something to talk about other than which of the two nutty old white dudes is nuttier or older or whiter. Kanye even said he would turn the White House into Wakanda! Come on, admit it, that would be funny. In a year that grows more insane by the day, Kanye’s lunacy is like an oasis.
But alas, it was just a mirage. According to Ben Jacobs at New York magazine, Kanye actually started spending money on staffers to get him on the ballot in Florida and South Carolina. It looked like he was really doing it! But then:
This all seemed real enough, and I reached out to West’s publicist for a response. The initial response was to loop in another spokesperson on the email. West’s team then went dark. As I waited for a response, I followed up with Kramer who told me, “He’s out.”
I asked what happened. “I’ll let you know what I know once I get all our stuff canceled. We had over 180 people out there today,” [election strategist Steve] Kramer said.
As pundit Siraj Hashmi notes, Kanye is now an Electoral College dropout.
So much for Election 2020 being entertaining. Instead of fun-crazy, we’ll just have to settle for crazy-crazy. But Kanye still wants you to vote:
To vote click below https://t.co/LRJ8hC5rGi#2020VISION pic.twitter.com/MJOVGYYYvQ
— ye (@kanyewest) July 9, 2020
Biden should take heed, because he could really earn some goodwill here. As a way to thank Kanye for not splitting the anti-Trump vote, Biden should make his VP pick Kanye’s mother(?)-in-law, Caitlyn Jenner. Not only would this fulfill Biden’s promise to make his vice president a woman, but it would prove he’s not a transphobe and he supports our Olympic athletes even after they permanently disqualify themselves from further competition.
But hey, who knows what’ll happen in the 112(!) days remaining until Election Day? Kanye might jump in and out of the race 3 or 4 more times before then. You just never know with that guy. And if you don’t like either of the two remaining choices, you can always write in Kanye. It’s hardly the worst choice anybody has ever made at the ballot box.
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