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Kanye West Gives a Glimpse of the Nightmare His Presidency Would Be
In an in-depth interview, Kanye West spoke to Forbes Magazine about what his presidency would look like.
On July 4th, Kanye West went to Twitter and announced that he was running for president. For some reason, people took him seriously, despite the fact that the deadline to run in a lot of states has passed and Kanye hasn't filled out any official paperwork. Add that to the fact that Kanye has known to do these kind of stunts for attention before.
Early on Wednesday morning, Forbes published an interview with Kanye where he went in-depth about what a Kanye West presidential run would look like, his relationship with President Donald Trump, how he feels about democratic nominee Joe Biden, having Covid-19, and more. Here's a warning, the interview is unhinged. Like, even by Kanye-standards this shit is crazy. (The writer of the piece described the process of talking to Kanye as “four rambling hours of interviews.”)
Here five quick takeaways.
Kanye is no longer Supporting Donald Trump
The most news-worthy portion of the interview is Kanye saying that he is not supporting Donald Trump anymore, saying "I am taking the red hat off, with this interview.” He also added that, “It looks like one big mess to me...I don’t like that I caught wind that he hid in the bunker.” (Last month, Trump was taken to a bunker after protesters were in front of the White House.) However, during a different portion of the interview, Kanye called Trump "the closest president we’ve had in years to allowing God to still be part of the conversation.” So, yeah, take the comments with a grain of salt.
Kanye also revealed that he is going to reach out to Trump's stepson and senior advisor Jared Kushner for help with his presidential campaign. West said that he is getting advice from Elon Musik — he wants him to run the space program — and his wife Kim Kardashian-West.
Kanye West is running under the "Birthday Party" banner
If he runs, Kanye would not be running as a Democrat or a Republican. He said he would run under the “Birthday Party” banner, “because when we win, it’s everybody’s birthday." It seemed like a troll comment because he later clarified that he would run "as a Republican if Trump wasn’t there." And that if he is there he would "run as an independent."
Kanye also revealed that his vice-presidential candidate would be Michelle Tidball, who is a preacher from Wyoming, where Kanye lives and has recently registered to vote (for the first time.) His slogan would be "Kanye West YES." And he's not worried about facing Joe Biden.
During the interview he said:
"Joe Biden? Like come on man, please. You know? Obama’s special. Trump’s special. We say Kanye West is special. America needs special people that lead. Bill Clinton? Special. Joe Biden’s not special.”
Kanye West would want his White House to be like Wakanda — whatever the fuck that means
During the interview, Kanye went in-depth about what a Kanye West presidency would look like. And, folks, the shit sounds like a mess. (He admits that he doesn't "have all of the pieces in the puzzle.") Kanye talked about having a White House model based on the fictional African country Wakanda from Black Panther. But, it wasn't clear what this meant. Here is what he said:
"Let’s get back to Wakanda… like in the movie in Wakanda when the king went to visit that lead scientist to have the shoes wrap around her shoes. Just the amount of innovation that can happen, the amount of innovation in medicine—like big pharma—we are going to work, innovate, together.This is not going to be some Nipsey Hussle being murdered, they’re doing a documentary, we have so many soldiers that die for our freedom, our freedom of information, that there is a cure for AIDS out there, there is going to be a mix of big pharma and holistic.”
Kanye also revealed that he was pro-life and hadn't "developed a foreign policy" plan of action. He said he would reinstate" the fear and love of God in all schools" and that he is against the death plenty. He also claimed he wants to get the chemicals out of the deodorant and toothpaste people use. And, oh yeah, he would put an "end" to police brutality. Easy peasy.
Despite the fact he had COVID-19, Kanye is also anti-vax
West revealed that he had COVID-19 back in February, saying that he had "chills" and was "shaking in bed." He also found a way to throw Drake's name in, saying: "I remember someone had told me Drake had the coronavirus and my response was Drake can’t be sicker than me!”
When it comes to curing COVID, Kanye believes more in prayer than traditional vaccines. In fact, while the world is searching for a vaccine to cure COVID, Kanye is strictly anti-vaccine:
“It’s so many of our children that are being vaccinated and paralyzed… So when they say the way we’re going to fix COVID is with a vaccine, I’m extremely cautious.That’s the mark of the beast. They want to put chips inside of us, they want to do all kinds of things, to make it where we can’t cross the gates of heaven. I'm sorry when I say they, the humans that have the Devil inside them. And the sad thing is that, the saddest thing is that we all won’t make it to heaven, that there’ll be some of us that do not make it. Next question.”
Kanye says he's not running for president as a publicity stunt.
Kanye says this is not to get publicity for God’s Country, his upcoming album, that very few people are talking about. He also added that he will give his “album away for free.”
It should be noted that his latest single, "Wash Us in the Blood," which features Travis Scott, debuted at number 49 on the Billboard Hot 100 and the video has garnered only 8 million views on YouTube since its release last week.
A day after the interview went viral, Forbes posted three freestyles Kanye West did on the phone while getting interviewed. The freestyles are called "This Is What The Covid’s Made," "Thou Shalt Not Kill," and “This Is Earth.” The freestyles are odd and, while brief, cover a lot of ground. On "This Is What The Covid's Made," Kanye name drops Trump, rapping, “How about we stop hiding in the bunkers and be a real man?”
On "Thou Shalt Not Kill," Kanye spends an extended amount of time rapping about the OJ Simpson trial and how it effected him. (Kim's late-father Robert Kardashian was one of OJ's closest friends and provided him legal counsel.) And "This Is Earth" is described by Forbes as being his "campaign song." Hm.
Listen to the freestyles below.
This story was updated on July 9th, 2020.