Plan B Forum

Just when you thought 2020 couldn’t get any weirder, rapper Kanye West declared his candidacy for US president.



The unlikely challenger to Donald Trump – of whom he has been a vocal supporter – and Joe Biden, chose American independence day to make the surprise announcement on Twitter, triggering a social media storm.

“We must now realize the promise of America by trusting God, unifying our vision and building our future,” West wrote. “I am running for president of the United States.”

The post was accompanied by a stars and stripes flag, an exclamation mark and “#2020VISION”. His wife, Kim Kardashian West, replied to the tweet with an American flag.

With just four months to go before polling day on 3 November, it was not clear whether West’s tweet would have been more fitting on April Fools’ day than American Independence Day.

Nor was it clear whether the 43-year-old had filed any official paperwork to appear on state election ballots. The deadline to add independent candidates to the ballot has not yet passed in many states.

But after businessman and reality TV star Trump won the White House in 2016, perhaps the idea of Kim Kardashian as first lady could be written in the stars as America’s fate.

And West, a 21-time Grammy award winner, picked up an immediate endorsement from Elon Musk, the chief executive of electric-car maker Tesla and another celebrity known for eccentric outbursts, who tweeted in reply: “You have my full support!”

A West-Musk ticket is not what anyone was expecting in an election that has already delivered a cornucopia of the unexpected.

West and his wife have visited Trump in the White House to discuss prison reform. At one bizarre meeting in 2018, West wore a red “Make America Great Again” cap and uttered words such as “motherfucker” and “infinite amounts of universe”. He said Trump made him feel like Superman, hugged him and declared: “I love this guy right here.”

Asked if West could be a future presidential candidate, Trump replied: “Could very well be.”

West replied: “Only after 2024. Let’s stop worrying about the future. All we really have is today. We just have today.”

Indeed, the rapper has floated the idea of running for president before. In January last year, a tweet that said simply “2024” was interpreted as a sign that he would run for the White House that year.

West was criticised last week after declaring: “I am so proud of my beautiful wife Kim Kardashian West for officially becoming a billionaire.” She had sold a stake in her beauty brand for $200m. But he also earned praise for releasing a single about racism and religion.

If he ran, West would follow in a long tradition of independent or third-party campaigns challenging the Democratic and Republican stranglehold. In 1992, Ross Perot, an eccentric Texan billionaire, took 19% of the vote. In 2000, Ralph Nader’s Green party took less than 3% but was widely blamed for costing Democrat Al Gore the presidency.

MajGenl.Meade wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 05, 2020 4:04 pm

"Got too" much what?

MajGenl.Meade wrote: ↑

Sun Jul 05, 2020 4:04 pm

"Got too" much what?

Kanye West has launched his campaign tour for the US presidential election in chaotic fashion at an event in Charleston, South Carolina, delivering a rambling address that touched on theology, homelessness, corporate power, and involved a long debate with an audience member about abortion.



West also suggested that women should be given $1m when they have a baby.

The rapper took to the stage at the event wearing a bulletproof vest, and “2020” shaved into his head. Without a mic, he proceeded to address a rowdy audience of a few hundred people, asking for complete silence before asserting that future events “will be in rooms where the acoustics will be incredible because I will be involved with the design”.

West repeatedly referenced the terms of his deal with Adidas, his faith in God and racism in the US, including an assertion that “[abolitionist] Harriet Tubman never actually freed the slaves, she just had the slaves go work for other white people”.

Tubman is one of the most respected figures of 19th century America. An African American who escaped slavery, she helped enslaved Black men and women travel north to freedom and fought for the Union during the Civil War. She later became a supporter of women’s suffrage.


'A self-centered publicity stunt': just how serious is Kanye West's presidential bid?
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But the event hit peak emotional intensity when West began to tell a story about what he believed was divine intervention into his life in a way that caused his wife, Kim Kardashian West, to refuse to terminate a pregnancy.

“I was having the rapper’s lifestyle,” he said. “I was sitting up in Paris, and I had my leather pants on … and I had my laptop up and I got all of my creative ideas … And the screen went black and white and God said, ‘if you fuck with my vision I’m going to fuck with yours’.

“And I called my wife and she said, we’re gonna have this baby. I said we’re gonna have this child … So even if my wife were to divorce me after this speech, she brought North into the world when I didn’t want to. She stood up and she protected that child.”

West then started crying when speaking about his father, who he said had wanted his mother to have an abortion when she was pregnant with him.

“My mom saved my life. My dad wanted to abort me. My mom saved my life. There would have been no Kanye West because my dad was too busy,” he said, sobbing into his hand, before shouting: “I almost killed my daughter! I almost killed my daughter!”

Referencing the media coverage of the event, he then said: “They’re going to run this, they’re going to tell you that I’m crazy. [Well] the world’s crazy!”

He then called up to the stage a pro-choice activist who had been yelling questions to him in response to his story. He claimed he understood “why someone would make the choice of getting an abortion” and eventually clarified that his position wasn’t that abortion should be banned, but rather that maximum financial assistance should be made available to women who do have children.

“My stance is not to make abortion illegal at all. It should always be legal. But there should be an option of maximum increase available … Maximum increase would be, everybody that has a baby gets a million dollars,” he said. He did not say where this money would come from.

“It takes a village to raise a child,” he said. “Society has been set up for single moms to not have a village, to not have a child.”

West’s remarks, which were mostly yelled in order to be heard by the crowd, repeatedly circled back to his Christianity.

“We are all equal in God’s eyes,” he said. “Sometimes people are controlled by demons, sometimes people are controlled by the environment that we are in but we are all God’s people, there [are] no bad people. There are lost people, but we are all God’s people.”

Struggling to be heard, West repeatedly told audience members to be quiet at the same time as assuring them that he was “not trying to quiet their voices”. The event ended after West was substantially drowned out by the shouting crowd.

West announced his intention to run for president on 5 July but he missed the deadline to qualify for the ballot in several states, and it was unclear if he was willing or able to collect enough signatures required to qualify in others.

Last week, he qualified to appear on Oklahoma’s presidential ballot, the first state where he met the requirements before the filing deadline.

West needed to collect 10,000 signatures by noon Monday to appear on the South Carolina ballot, according to state law. The entertainer tweeted out a list of locations around the Charleston area where petitions could be signed

MajGenl.Meade wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 20, 2020 2:04 pm

I guess the child is called North West . . . what you get when an airhead is your daddy

Joe Guy wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 20, 2020 7:56 pm

If what I read is true, they is bipolar and refuses to take medication for it.

Joe Guy wrote: ↑

Mon Jul 20, 2020 7:56 pm

Since I don't follow Kanye's career I just did some quick research on him. If what I read is true, he is bipolar and refuses to take medication for it. That would explain a lot. It also makes me feel sorry for the guy. Until now, I thought he was just a stupid self-centered guy with a big ego. You know. Like our president.