This is a confusing time to be a Kanye West fan, but his mother-in-law Kris Jenner promises that despite the string of confounding, controversial — and, for some, offensive — comments he’s been making lately, the rapper’s heart is in the right place.
Jenner appeared on The Ellen Show Friday (May 4), where Ellen DeGeneres asked her “what’s going on?” and wondered if West was okay after a week in which he drew fire for calling slavery “a choice.”
“Kanye has a lot of love for all of you, all of his fans, and everybody who’s been there to support him forever,” Jenner said, calling it a “relief” when the talk show host noted that they weren’t going to talk about the rapper the whole time. “And I know that he will explain himself in his own way,” Jenner added. While she would not respond directly to the more eyebrow-raising comments from ‘Ye, she reiterated that she thinks his statements are coming from the right place.
“I think that anything he does, and I just think this is important to say is, he always does things with really good intentions,” she said. “So I’m going to let him explain himself when the time is ready.” Like the rest of us, Jenner said she just keeps “rolling” on, trying to keep up with the relentless pace of tweets and interviews that have flooded the zone lately.
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In an interview on Tuesday (May 1), West went on TMZ and defended his recent hard embrace of Pres. Donald Trump and a picture in which he posed with a “Make America Great Again” hat. “People were taught how to think, we’re taught how to feel. We don’t know how to think for ourselves,” he said. We don’t know how to feel for ourselves. People say, ‘Feel free,’ but they don’t really want us to feel free and I felt a freedom… I just love Trump, that’s my boy.”
But it was his comment about slavery that caused some hard blowback from a number of ‘Ye’s fellow rappers, friends and peers. “When you hear about slavery for 400 years — for 400 years? That sounds like a choice,” he said. “Like, you were there for 400 years and it’s all of you all?” Will.I.Am said the comment “broke my heart” and filmmaker Spike Lee responded, “My Brother, OUR ancestors did not choose to be stolen from mother Africa.”
Watch the interview below.
This article originally appeared in Billboard.
