Kanye West won’t make Illinois ballot due to invalid signatures

Karma Oak

Kanye West's unrealistic presidential bid has hit another hurdle. Having already missed the deadline to appear on multiple states' ballots, and withdrawn his petition to appear on NJ's (after a formal complaint filed with the state pointed out irregularities, including incomplete signatures, missing addresses, and similar handwriting), it appears Kanye won't be listed on ballots in his home state of Illinois, either. The Chicago Tribune reports that, of the 3,218 signatures from IL voters Kanye submitted, 1,928 of them were found to be invalid by a state elections board review. 2,500 valid signatures were required to be submitted altogether.

In Wisconsin, meanwhile, The Milwakee Journal Sentinel reports that the state's Democratic Party filed a complaint to block Kanye from appearing on ballots in the state, citing, yet again, issues with signatures. They were late to be submitted, according to the complaint, and include incorrect addresses and fake signatures like "Mickey Mouse" and "Bernie Sanders." WI Democrats have also obtained affidavits from six people who said they were mislead into signing Kanye's paperwork.

Although Kanye previously previously said he's running as a third party candidate in his made up "The Birthday Party," Republicans and Trump supporters have been helping him in his presidential run, perhaps hoping he'll take away votes from Joe Biden. Forbes asked him about that in a recent interview:

Amid various reports that Republican and Trump-affiliated political operatives are trying to get Kanye West onto various state ballots for November’s presidential election, the billionaire rap superstar indicated, in an interview by text today, that he was in fact running to siphon votes from the presumptive Democratic nominee, Joe Biden.

Asked about that directly, West said that rather than running for president, he was “walking,” quickly adding that he was “walking . . . to win.”

When it was pointed out that he actually can’t win in 2020—that he won’t be on enough ballots to yield 270 electoral votes, and that a write-in campaign isn’t feasible—and thus was serving as a spoiler, West replied: “I’m not going to argue with you. Jesus is King.”