Wait, Can Kanye West Actually Run For President at This Point? Here’s What We Know

When a lot of the nation was busy making ready to shoot off fireworks — most likely nonetheless hanging out of their backyards after a day stuffed with barbecuing — Kanye West dropped a significantly epic announcement by way of Twitter.

“We should now understand the promise of America by trusting God, unifying our imaginative and prescient and constructing our future. I’m working for president of america,” he tweeted alongside an American flag emoji.

Loads of Twitter customers may need initially disregarded Kanye’s announcement — contemplating his historical past with Twitter rants and all. That’s, till his spouse Kim Kardashian West seemingly confirmed it was no unhinged, spur-of-the-moment put up. The KKW Magnificence mogul retweeted Kanye’s message, including her personal American flag for good measure.

Let’s simply say loads of Twitter customers weren’t amused by Kanye declaring that he is working for president on July 4, simply 4 months earlier than Election Day. However there have been nonetheless loads of hilarious responses anyway.

Nonetheless others puzzled if Kanye working for president was a part of some elaborate plan between the rapper and President Trump to take votes away from Biden. (Or maybe a publicity stunt ahed of the discharge of his new album.)

Again in 2015, Kanye talked about working for president throughout the VMAs after he obtained the Video Vanguard Award.

‘Ye additionally tweeted in April 2018, “2024,” with none additional rationalization. The next day, he tweeted, “once we turn out to be president we now have to vary the title of the airplane from Air Drive one to Yeezy power one.”

Folks largely laughed it these incidents on the time — however who’s laughing now?

In November 2019, Kanye spoke throughout the Quick Firm Innovation Competition with Yeezy shoe designer, Steven Smith. The pair was speaking in regards to the model when Kanye all of a sudden stated, “Once I run for president in 2024…” earlier than the viewers interrupted him with laughter.

“… What y’all laughing at?” Kanye requested, after which continued, “Once I run for president in 2024, we’d create so many roles that I am not going to run, I’ll stroll.”

The brief reply is sure. Nevertheless it’s difficult. As a result of it is extremely unlikely he would beat out Donald Trump because the Republic candidate or Joe Biden because the Democratic candidate, Kanye would wish to register as an unbiased with a purpose to seem on a ballet for the 2020 election.

BallotPedia outlines a path for Kanye to run as an unbiased candidate — however there’s positively some hoops he’ll have to leap.

“Typically talking, an unbiased presidential candidate should petition for placement on the final election poll in all 50 states in addition to Washington, D.C. A handful of states might permit an unbiased candidate to pay a submitting charge in lieu of submitting a petition,” in keeping with the web site.

“The strategies for calculating what number of signatures are required fluctuate from state to state, as do the precise signature necessities. For example, some states set up a flat signature requirement. Different states calculate signature necessities as percentages of voter registration or votes forged for a given workplace.”

The factor is, it appears Kanye has already missed the deadline for submitting a petition in quite a lot of key states, together with Texas, New York, and Illinois, which, as Hunter Walker with Yahoo Information defined, are “three of the highest six when it comes to electoral faculty votes. There are a number of different deadlines developing within the subsequent couple weeks.” Deadlines in different states are looming, as effectively.

In lieu of working as an unbiased, Kanye may additionally go for the write-in spot for the 2020 president election. This could require him to file paperwork forward of the election in 33 states, in keeping with BalletPedia. To not point out, write-in voting for presidential candidates is not even an choice in 9 states. The remainder of the states do not require any particular paperwork to be stuffed earlier than the election.

So sure, Kanye West working for president may truly occur — and primarily based on his July Four Twitter announcement, it is already occurring. As for Kanye attracting sufficient votes to matter, that is one thing else solely. He has the potential to take votes from both Trump or Biden and in the end, make a distinction within the consequence of the 2020 election.

It will be fascinating to see what occurs come Nov. 3. And hey, even when it does not play out in Kanye’s favor, there’s all the time 2024.