Rapper Kanye West has inspired very mixed reactions since admitting he admires such prominent conservatives as the president of the United States and commentator Candace Owens.
Though his album sales have not been hurt, many other artists have blasted him for daring to have an opinion outside of extreme leftism.
“Just as a musician, African-American, guy out in Hollywood, all these different things, you know, everyone around me tried to pick my candidate for me,” the rapper told Kimmel, who of course is an outspoken anti-Trumper. “And then told me every time I said I liked Trump that I couldn’t say it out loud or my career would be over. I’d get kicked out of the black community because blacks — we’re supposed to have a monolithic thought, we can only, like, we can only be Democrats and all.”
West said it took over a year for him to have the “confidence to stand up.”
And fans knew his true feelings when they saw him wearing a Make America Great Again hat.
“I didn’t have the confidence to take on the world and the possible backlash and it took me a year and a half to have the confidence to stand up and put on the hat no matter what the consequences were,” he said.
He continued, “And what it represented to me is not about policies — because I’m not a politician like that. But it represented overcoming fear and doing what you felt, no matter what anyone said, in saying, you can’t bully me. Liberals can’t bully me, news can’t bully me, the hip-hop community — they can’t bully me.”
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