July 15, 2020 at 05:25PM
Update, 7/15: Steve Kramer, a political advisor who’d been hired to get West on the ballot in Florida and South Carolina, recently told New York Magazine‘s The Intelligencer that West is “out” of the 2020 presidential race.
Kramer reportedly said, “I have nothing good or bad to say about Kanye. Everyone has their personal decision about why they make decisions. Running for president has to be one of the hardest things for someone to actually contemplate at that level.”
Original post, 7/5: Kanye West announced on the Fourth of July that he is running for president in 2020. In a tweet late on Saturday night, West wrote: 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.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who previously endorsed Andrew Yang, replied to the tweet: “You have my full support!”
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But as soon as Twitter users saw this late-night announcement, they started looking into whether West had actually taken any action to file his campaign with the Federal Election Committee (FEC). They found that West has actually already missed the deadline for filing with the FEC in several states. The deadline to add independent candidates to the ballot has not passed in several states.
Meanwhile, West’s wife, Kim Kardashian, appeared to endorse her husband’s decision on Twitter. She retweeted his announcement and added an emoji of the American flag:
In a September 2016 interview with Wonderland magazine, Kardashian addressed her husband’s ambitions to run for president in 2020. At the time, she appeared to be lighthearted at the prospect of her husband actually making a run for the White House.
“Look at all the awful things they’re doing to Melania [Trump], putting up the naked photos [of her]…I’ll say to Kanye: ‘Babe, you know the kind of photos they’d put up of me!’ Haha.”
Although West has mentioned his political ambitions in the past, this is the first official-sounding announcement he’s made this year. In GQ’s May issue, he seemed to indicate he is backing Trump this year.
“We know who I’m voting on,” West said then. “And I’m not going to be told by the people around me and the people that have their agenda that my career is going to be over.”
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