Kanye West‘s presidential campaign hopes haven’t been dashed yet!
The Chicago native and prolific music producer made a last-ditch effort over the weekend to get on the November ballot in his home state of Illinois. And although it cost him a little bit of cash — reportedly over $30,000 — he did what he had to do and now, Chicagoans can apparently vote for their native son. But will they?!
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Here’s how it went down, according to TMZ. Sources with “direct knowledge” of campaign activities told the outlet that Yeezy’s staffers hired a third-party vendor called Let The Voters Decide to collect the required 2,500 at-large signatures for him to show up on Illinois’ ballot in November, per state law.
The deadline for gathering and submitting the signatures is Monday evening, at 5:00 pm, but Ye’s campaign pushed the envelope and had workers do double-time all weekend, getting enough signatures back with more than a day to spare. Apparently, the third-party vendor sent out 45 people who hit the streets in neighborhoods all over the state, racking up all the required signatures in about 24 hours’ time.
What’s more is Kanye apparently paid handsomely for their efforts, dishing out a reported $10-$12 per signature. The group ended up collecting over 3,100 signatures, so when you do the math on that one… yeah! Not a bad pay day! And it’s got an A-lister on the ballot for President. Only in America, ya know?
One of the signature collectors confirmed the work to the media outlet, telling them he worked for about three hours over the weekend and got 56 signatures at $10 each. Not a bad way to make some weekend coin! There’s an important distinction here, too: voters weren’t signing the pledge to vote for Kanye; they were merely signing to support him being added to the ballot, with no requirement to ever support him. Still, it’s not a bad show of emergency support just to get him on the ballot!!!
BTW, according to the report, the going rate for signatures in this situation is about $1 to $3 per signature, so it sure seems like Yeezy paid out the a** to keep his presidential campaign going. Hey, desperate times call for desperate measures, right?! We get it. Gotta rush forward with this right now, because he’s already way behind schedule when it comes to campaigning and all! At least he’s got name recognition to fall back on!
Related: Wait, Kanye And The Biebs Are Hanging Out In Wyoming?!
For what it’s worth, Illinois may be one of the few states Yeezy could even do that well in, considering his long-standing ties to Chicago. Then again, who knows… liberal voters in the big cities may want to dump Donald Trump at all costs, and opt to do the sure thing with Joe Biden no matter what they’re given in the third-party realm. This is an important election, after all.
What do U think, Perezcious readers?? Could Yeezy make a run at it this cycle, or is he just too late in playing catch-up and trying to get on ballots state to state? And all this says nothing of the rift the campaign is apparently causing within his family and inner circle, too, so… yeah…
Sound OFF with your take on his presidential campaign hopes and more, down in the comments (below)!
[Image via WENN]
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