What a difference a few years make. Kim Kardashian feared what others thought when then-husband Kanye West began wearing a red, Donald Trump-supporting “Make America Great Again” hat in 2018. Now, the entrepreneur says that she regrets asking the rapper to not wear the MAGA hat during an appearance on Saturday Night Live that year.
Kim, 41, told journalist Bari Weiss in a new interview, “I was very nervous. I didn’t want him to wear the red hat. I’m not really a rule breaker, so my personality would be like, ‘OK, you guys don’t like the red hat? I’ll take it off.’ I remember other people were around and it became a thing where he wasn’t going to go on because he wanted to be who he is.”
“I’m very neutral, but that night I was very forceful with him and argued with him, like, ‘You have to take that hat off.’ And now looking back, I think, why should he take that off if that’s what he believes in? Why can’t he wear that on TV? Half of the country voted for him [Trump], so clearly, other people like him,” the SKIMS founder continued. Kim herself later met with Trump in 2018 to discuss criminal justice reform.
Kim said, “I learned a lot from that situation. No matter what, it taught me to be a little bit more empathetic for people that just want to do what they want to do: freedom of speech! And if you want to wear the hat, wear the hat. I respect the fact that he knew exactly what he believed in and always stood by that.”
Kanye, 44, recently addressed the three-year-old MAGA hat issue during a Thanksgiving prayer video, which he shared on Instagram on November 25. “My wife did not like me wearing the red hat,” he narrated over video’s images, adding, “Being a good wife, she just wanted to protect me and our family. I made me and our family a target by not aligning with Hollywood’s political stance, and that was hard for our marriage.” Kim filed for divorce from the “Stronger” rapper in February 2021, after more than 10 years together, six of them as husband and wife. The former couple share four young children.
Kim added her thoughts on cancel culture, “If I worried about every last thing that someone said and I had to try to change it, then I would never be me. Anyone wouldn’t be them!” she revealed, adding, “That’s why I think cancel culture is the most ridiculous thing, because I really do believe … in rehabilitation and freedom of speech. I’ve never really been into cancel culture.”