On October 11th, 2018, Kanye West visited the White House along with Jim Brown to have a talk with President Trump. West and Trump have been friendly with each other for while ever since Kanye West came out as a Trump supporter on Twitter. The meeting was transcribed into writing on www.whitehouse.gov.  The meeting began with everyone greeting each other. Trump briefly spoke about his friendship with Brown and West. The first topic the trio spoke about was North Korea. Trump spoke about the diplomatic actions that he and his administration have taken in order to avoid war. Kanye then advocated for Larry Hoover. Hoover had been sentenced to six life sentences for what was described as a “conspiracy from prison.” Kanye West’s reasoning for why advocating for Larry Hoover was that in an alternate universe, he could have been in the same place as Hoover. After this, Kanye went into his theory about how most black people are Democrats because of welfare. He then talked about how he is courageous enough to support Trump and the Republican party despite the color of his skin. West spoke about how the MAGA hat gives him power by giving him the male energy that he has been lacking in his life.

Afterwards, Kanye spoke about some of his successes in business especially with Adidas where he took a huge risk, but ended up succeeding. Some of the key issues that Kanye West had been focusing on were bringing jobs back to America, helping people with mental health issues, and abolishing the thirteenth amendment. Kanye West spoke about how he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and sleep deprivation. He then jumped to how American industry should be empowered and one way in which we could empower the country would be to improve the vision of the President.

One of the reporters monitoring the meeting asked Kanye about how he criticized President Bush for not caring about black people, but seemed to ignore criticism of Donald Trump. He responded by saying that back then he bought into a victim mentality that oppressed black people. He said that the concept of racism is used by racism in order to control people and drive them away from things that might benefit them. Another reporter asked Kanye West what he wanted President Trump to do for Chicago. He spoke about how stop and frisk failed to help the city and how tax breaks would greatly help the economy in the city. He also proposed how educational reform could help people succeed. One of the reporters brought up how West and Trump disagree on the issue of stop and frisk and Trump said that he is open to changing his mind.

Kanye subsequently went on about how people should focus on the present and not go into the past. He proposed that Trump should change his slogan to “Make America Great,” as opposed to “Make America Great Again,” because the current slogan focuses too much on the past and it drives away a lot of black people due to the racism that existed in previous American generations.

The meeting ended on friendly terms. Despite Kanye West’s disagreements with Trump on certain issues, not much argument took place. Kanye concluded the talk by giving Trump a hug. Afterwards, the trio had lunch.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-meeting-kanye-west-jim-brown/