Only in 2020 could Kanye screw us over with four more years of Trump. They're all in on this, maybe Kanye is too. Yes he has mental health issues, but he can still understand what's going on here.
NY Times
Republicans Aid Kanye West’s Bid to get on the 2020 Ballot
Republican activists in at least half a dozen states are deeply involved in the effort to get Kanye West’s name before voters, renewing questions about the aim of his campaign.
Aug. 4, 2020
By Danny Hakim and Maggie Haberman
The effort to get Kanye West on the ballot as a third-party candidate in several states is increasingly looking like an operation run by President Trump’s allies and Republican activists that is aimed at diverting votes from Joseph R. Biden Jr.
The move, which comes as Mr. West’s wife, Kim Kardashian West, has said her husband is struggling with mental illness, underscores that this will be an unusual, and unusually bare-knuckled, presidential election.
The strategy became overt on Tuesday, when Lane Ruhland, a lawyer who has worked for the Trump campaign, delivered ballot signatures to Wisconsin elections officials on behalf of the West campaign.
Ms. Ruhland worked for the state Republican Party during Wisconsin’s recount in the 2016 presidential election. She has been representing the Trump campaign in a lawsuit filed this year against a Wisconsin television station for airing an advertisement criticizing the president’s coronavirus response.
A spokesman for the law firm where Ms. Ruhland works, Husch Blackwell, said she was unavailable for comment.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel also reported that at least five other people connected to Mr. West’s Wisconsin bid are active in the Republican Party or are Trump supporters.
Tim Murtaugh, a Trump campaign spokesman, said there was no legal conflict with a Trump campaign lawyer’s involvement in the West operation. “We have no knowledge of anything Kanye West is doing or who is doing it for him,” Mr. Murtaugh said.
Several other people active in the party are connected to Mr. West’s candidacy. One operative, Mark Jacoby, is an executive at a company called Let the Voters Decide, which has been collecting signatures for the West campaign in Ohio, West Virginia and Arkansas. Mr. Jacoby was arrested on voter fraud charges in 2008 while he was doing work for the California Republican Party, and he later pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor.
Mr. Jacoby, in a statement, said his company was nonpartisan and worked for all political parties. “We do not comment on any current clients, but like all Americans, anyone who is qualified to stand for election has the right to run,” he said.
On Wednesday, Vice reported that a Republican operative in Colorado, Rachel George, was helping Mr. West get on the ballot there. She did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
New York Magazine reported Monday evening on the campaign’s links to two other people with partisan ties. One is Gregg Keller, the former executive director of the American Conservative Union, who has been listed as a contact for the campaign in Arkansas. Mr. Keller, who did not respond to a message seeking comment, is a Missouri-based strategist. He was under consideration to be Mr. Trump’s campaign manager in 2015, a role that was ultimately filled by Corey Lewandowski, according to a former campaign official.
Another person linked to the West campaign is Chuck Wilton, who is listed as a convention delegate for Mr. Trump from Vermont and as an elector with the West operation who could potentially cast an Electoral College vote for Mr. West. Mr. Wilton could not be reached. He and his wife, Wendy, a Trump appointee at the United States Department of Agriculture, have been political supporters of the president. She hung up immediately when called at her office.
The nature of the financial relationships between the West campaign and the operatives, if any, was not immediately clear.
Mr. West missed the deadline to get on the ballot in many states, but could serve as a spoiler in others, including battlegrounds like Wisconsin and Ohio, where signatures were filed on his behalf on Wednesday. Mr. Trump himself suggested last month that Mr. West could siphon votes from Mr. Biden, who has clinched the Democratic nomination.
Republicans seemed upbeat about his entry into the race.
“It appears that the Kanye West campaign made a smart decision by hiring an experienced election attorney,” said Alesha Guenther, a spokeswoman for the Wisconsin state Republican Party, after Ms. Ruhland dropped off the ballot signatures. “We welcome Kanye West and all other candidates who qualified for ballot access to the race.”
Mr. West was until recently a fervent supporter of Mr. Trump and said they shared a “dragon energy,” but he declared early last month that he would run for president.
Mr. West developed a relationship with Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, after Ms. Kardashian West worked with Mr. Trump on criminal justice reform efforts. Mr. Kushner declined to comment, but a person close to him said that while Mr. West had periodically reached out to him, Mr. Kushner hadn’t been stoking a run to divert votes away from Mr. Biden.
Soon after Mr. West’s announcement, he explained that he was going to use a Wakanda-like management approach, referring to the fictional country from “Black Panther.” His running mate, Michelle Tidball, is a self-described “biblical life coach” based in Cody, Wyo., where the Wests have a ranch. Ms. Tidball, according to TMZ, once advocated making beds and doing dishes as a way to treat mental illness.
During an appearance in South Carolina last month, Mr. West broke down crying. He later tweeted that Ms. Kardashian West “tried to bring a doctor to lock me up.” Amid his erratic behavior, his wife has spoken out about her husband’s struggles with mental illness, and Mr. West has publicly apologized to his wife for some of his comments.
A spokeswoman for Mr. West referred questions to the campaign, which did not respond to requests for comment. A spokeswoman for the Kardashian family also had no immediate comment.
Asked about Mr. West’s efforts on Wednesday evening, Mr. Trump said he had no knowledge of what the rapper was doing. He also spared Mr. West the type of criticism he usually unleashes against anyone who opposes him, as Mr. West ostensibly would be doing.
“I get along with him very well,” Mr. Trump said, adding that it remained to be seen if Mr. West gets on states’ ballots. “I’m not involved.”