Kanye is out (UPDATE: Kanye is in again)

[Alben Barkley]

Well f—k.

This changes EVERYTHING.

New official prediction:

Kanye West/Kid Cudi: 538 electoral votes, 151,000,000 votes/100%

Joe Biden/Kamala Harris: 0 electoral votes, 0 votes/0%

Donald Trump/Mike Pence: 0 electoral votes, 0 votes/0%

[Alben Barkley]

Kanye will bring people into his camp, and then will bring them to Trump when Trump makes him part of his campaign.

Rasmussen Poll few weeks ago had black support for Trump up since the protests, the more conservative black voters are going to become Republican. Kanye is kind of a way to help boost those voters to Trumps side.

The black vote has been taken for granted, and between Kanye, Tim Scott, Candace Owens and a lot of people I see on YouTube who are black trump supporters (with big followings) they know what rioting leads to. Detroit rioted in the 1960s & the city never recovered. Trump will probably win 30% of the black vote. Trumps voter base is working class people & a lot of black people, especially working class black men, have done a lot better financially under Trump than they ever did under Obama.

Trump will gain black support compared to 2016, but even if he does everything right he will have trouble hitting 13%.

Based on what?

The recent WaPo poll showing him much closer to Obama 2012 numbers than Hillary 2016 numbers with black people?

Complete bulls—t pulled out of your ass?

Literally nothing?

Which one?

[Alben Barkley]

Out of all of the albums that routinely make best-of-decade lists, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is the one where its hype confounds me the most. If that's a five star album, then I'm Pope Francis.

Regardless of my opinion of his work, he's past the filing deadline in many states. Even if he does get on the ballot, he seems more likely to pull would-be-Trump voters than would-be-Biden voters.

It will be interesting to see how this develops.

HOLY sh**t.

I didn’t know Pope Francis used this board!!!

[Alben Barkley]

Out of all of the albums that routinely make best-of-decade lists, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is the one where its hype confounds me the most. If that's a five star album, then I'm Pope Francis.

Regardless of my opinion of his work, he's past the filing deadline in many states. Even if he does get on the ballot, he seems more likely to pull would-be-Trump voters than would-be-Biden voters.

It will be interesting to see how this develops.

HOLY sh**t.

I didn’t know Pope Francis used this board!!!

I didn't either

You are so humble, Your Holiness!

When did you move to Washington?

[Alben Barkley]

Kanye will bring people into his camp, and then will bring them to Trump when Trump makes him part of his campaign.

Rasmussen Poll few weeks ago had black support for Trump up since the protests, the more conservative black voters are going to become Republican. Kanye is kind of a way to help boost those voters to Trumps side.

The black vote has been taken for granted, and between Kanye, Tim Scott, Candace Owens and a lot of people I see on YouTube who are black trump supporters (with big followings) they know what rioting leads to. Detroit rioted in the 1960s & the city never recovered. Trump will probably win 30% of the black vote. Trumps voter base is working class people & a lot of black people, especially working class black men, have done a lot better financially under Trump than they ever did under Obama.

Trump will gain black support compared to 2016, but even if he does everything right he will have trouble hitting 13%.

Based on what?

The recent WaPo poll showing him much closer to Obama 2012 numbers than Hillary 2016 numbers with black people?

Complete bulls—t pulled out of your ass?

Literally nothing?

Which one?

Trump's support was highest among black men under age 35 in that poll. An increasing number of black Americans are first-generation Caribbean/African immigrants who are more like 75-80% Dem than 95%. First Step Act. Also I believe there will be a shy Trump vote as certain kinds of Trump voters are likely to ignore any media or organization, polling included, not directly connected to their bubble.

Shy Trump vote is BS that has been thoroughly debunked.

As for younger black men more likely to support Trump, well if anything that just means any Kanye candidacy will HELP Biden because that’s probably the most likely group to vote for him.

In any case, does not change the FACT that Biden easily has AT LEAST somewhere between Hillary 2016 and Obama 2012 overall black support. There is literally no evidence or reason to believe that he will go DOWN from Hillary 2016, at the very least.

[Alben Barkley]

Well, we had a good run

Later that day, I talked to Steve Kramer. He is a get-out-the-vote specialist who runs a firm that also helps candidates get on the ballot. Kramer, who has worked mostly for Democratic candidates but has also had some Republican clients, told me that he had been hired to help West get on the ballot in Florida and South Carolina. He added that his understanding was that West’s team was “working over weekend there, formalizing the FEC and other things that they’ve got to do when you have a lot of corporate lawyers involved.”

...

This all seemed real enough, and I reached out to West’s publicist for a response. The initial response was to loop in another spokesperson on the email. West’s team then went dark. As I waited for a response, I followed up with Kramer who told me, “He’s out.”

I asked what happened. “I’ll let you know what I know once I get all our stuff canceled. We had over 180 people out there today,” Kramer said.

I love how we engaged in over a week of hand-wringing across 14 pages, only for it to lead to this inevitable outcome.  Good going, Atlas.

I guess everyone’s a little too scarred over 2016. Wouldn’t have surprised anyone at the time if a couple weeks after Trump announced it all turned out to be a publicity stunt and he was never gonna actually run.