Elon Musk has some advice regarding Kanye West‘s 2020 presidential bid: Wait four more years.
In a wide-ranging interview with The New York Times published Saturday (July 25), the Tesla and SpaceX founder gave his thoughts on West’s plans to run for president and touched on the rapper and fashion mogul’s recent Twitter rants.
After West tweeted on July 4 that he was running for president, Musk quickly responded, “You have my full support!” Musk believes, however, that 2024 might be a better time for the rapper’s ambitious political run.
“I’ve done my best to convince him that 2024 would be better than 2020,” Musk told The Times, explaining that he wouldn’t want West to be accused of splitting the Black vote for presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
During the interview, Musk, who said he’s known West for “at least 10 years,” also noted that he checked up on the rapper following his recent “tweet rampage,” during which Ye accused his wife, Kim Kardashian, of sending a doctor to Wyoming to “lock me up” and claimed that the 2017 horror movie Get Out was about him, among other seemingly unconnected topics.
“When he was about a third of the way through the tweet rampage, just to see if he was doing OK, I sent him a text saying, you know, just checking on you, a lot of people are worried, just wondering if you’re OK,” Musk said. “And he called me back and he actually seemed fine. He video FaceTimed me and he was in Wyoming with a bunch of friends. He seemed fine on the call. But it sounds like things are, you know, not fine. There seem to be a lot of issues.”
Kardashian later came to the defense of her husband, sharing a statement addressing his struggle with bi-polar disorder.
“He is a brilliant but complicated person who on top of the pressures of being an artist and a black man, who experienced the painful loss of his mother, has to deal with the pressure and isolation that is heightened by his bi-polar disorder,” Kardashian wrote. “Those who are close with Kanye know his heart and understand his words some times do not align with his intentions.”
During his first campaign rally in South Carolina on July 19, West spoke about a number of topics — including the healthcare system, supporting the LGBTQ+ community and gun control — before breaking down in tears during a candid discussion about abortion.
On Saturday, West apologized to Kardashian on Twitter for speaking about their personal life on the public stage.
“I would like to apologize to my wife Kim for going public with something that was a private matter. I did not cover her like she has covered me. To Kim I want to say I know I hurt you. Please forgive me. Thank you for always being there for me,” West wrote.