Kanye West wants you to know that he did not vote in last week’s presidential election. But if he was going to, he would have voted for Donald Trump.
The rapper, who also reaffirmed his desire to run for president in 2020, made the comments to a SAP Center crowd last night in San Jose. It was the latest stop of his Saint Pablo tour, which hits TD Garden in Boston on December 28. “I told y’all I didn’t vote, right?” Kanye said, via multiple fan tweets and posts, which you can watch below via Pitchfork. “But if I would’ve voted, I would’ve voted for Trump.”
Kanye went on an extended political rant about how he admired aspects of Trump’s campaign, and it drew mostly boos from the crowd. “I actually think that [Trump’s] approach was absolutely genius,” he said. “Because it fucking worked!” Elsewhere, he added: “There’s nonpolitical methods to speaking that I like, that I feel were very futuristic. And that style, and that method of communication, has proven that it can beat a politically correct way of communication. And I fuck with that.”
He also told African-Americans in the crowd that they need to stop zeroing in on racism: “Specifically to black people, stop focusing on racism. This world is racist, OK? Let’s stop being distracted to focus on that as much.”
Kanye also possibly alluded to his well-known desire to seek presidency of the United States. “Sometimes things that you might think are bad need to happen, in order for change to fucking happen. Sometimes you might have to not get your way to really understand what to do in the future, to be able to get your way.”
Hear his comments below.
"I would have voted for Trump." – Kanye West pic.twitter.com/g9qxaT7aRc
— billy (@billycrossover) November 18, 2016
Kanye West tonight speaking on racism in America. "Specifically to black people, stop talking about race so much." pic.twitter.com/HTWlJgdq7E
— Brandon E. Patterson (@myblackmindd) November 18, 2016
"I told y'all I didn't vote… if I would've voted, I would've voted on Trump." – Kanye West @ComplexMag @HipHopDX @IamAkademiks pic.twitter.com/Vsh9nR0qNs
— Aries Nunez (@Aries_Nunez) November 18, 2016