Donald Trump, Sheff G, and Sleepy Hallow in the Bronx. Photo by Steven Ferdman/GC Images
When Kanye West revealed his support for Trump back in 2016 it was a scandal; nowadays, a rapper backing the 2024 Republican presidential nominee is barely news. Trump received the endorsements of Lil Pump, Lil Wayne, and Kodak Black during the 2020 election cycle (and gave presidential pardons to the latter two after losing), and 2024 has only been more fruitful. As Democrats make moves of their own, the tug-of-war offers a view of hip-hop’s enduring place and power in American culture.
The Trump campaign’s hip-hop outreach in recent months has pivoted to the underground, with the ex-president linking up with Peezy and Icewear Vezzo in Detroit and appearing with OT7 Quanny in Pennsylvania. Those rappers may have danced around a clearcut endorsement, unlike New Yorkers Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow back in June, but you imagine the optics of their appearances matter more to the Presidential hopeful than anything the artists might have to say. In a surreally fitting twist, these meetings have been assisted by Billy McFarland of Fyre Fest infamy, another career grifter with a history of leveraging celebrity cosigns for personal gain. One imagines a Zyn-chewing campaign staffer watching Sexyy Red on Theo Von’s podcast last fall and approaching their boss with a research dossier.
Trump has long been invoked by rappers as an icon of capitalist success despite his documented history of racist behavior. But the news of his attempted assassination in mid-July kicked things into overdrive, and a potential watershed moment in history quickly turned into fodder for irreverent memes and brain-rotting videos. There were the prerequisite jokes about second shooters and CIA conspiracies, and at least three emoji-laden chain texts my friends and I forwarded to each other. Then, hip-hop began to respond.
Chief Keef's clothing brand Glo Gang posted a graphic of their sun-faced mascot as Trump, face smeared with blood and fist outstretched beneath an American flag; Gallery Provence, the artist behind album covers for Sexyy Red, Drakeo the Ruler, KP Skywalka, and plenty more, made a quick sketch of Trump extending his middle finger as he was loaded into an ambulance. My personal favorite for sheer absurdity came from Peezy, who posted an ultra-HD photo of himself and the Republican presidential nominee with the caption "HARDBODY" less than an hour after the shooting.
These memes are a silly niche in the digital ground game of a critical, polarizing election, but they feel like a social media snapshot of just how normalized Trump has become. From Teamsters President Sean O’Brien speaking at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee to the announcement that Trump would appear at this year’s National Association of Black Journalists Convention, the GOP candidate has made surprising inroads courting traditional bastions of the left, despite Democrats’ attempts to cast the election in existential terms. In that context, hip-hop endorsements of Trump feel less like an anomaly than an indicator of how (un)seriously more casual voters are taking this election.
While it’s unlikely that even the most diehard stan would base their vote off a celebrity endorsement, these cosigns can excite voters who are already fans of a politician and a musician. Candidates’ efforts to appeal to younger voters have been front and center ever since MTV first launched “Rock The Vote,” though Hillary Clinton asking Gen Z to “Pokemon GO to the polls” brought them into the swampy domain of memes.
The 2020 election featured similar efforts at cultural outreach by the Biden campaign including the President’s appearance on The Breakfast Club, a custom Fortnite map, and an election ad soundtracked by Eminem.
But politicians’ digital strategies have only grown more sophisticated in the years since the pandemic. In recent weeks, the Trump campaign has posted TikToks featuring “Attitude” by Cash Cobain (likely without the artist’s permission) as well as YouTube brothers Jake and Logan Paul; in one clip, Trump remarks, “we’re with those young people… they’re smart, and we’re going to take them every time.”
Team Kamala has tilted more towards pop, setting TikToks to Chappell Roan tracks and leaning in hard on the coveted (albeit British) Charli XCX cosign, but their social media managers can get similarly freaky with it: this edit soundtracked by a mashup of Chappell and white rapper du jour ian feels disconcertingly fried, the sort of brain-rotted video my friends would drop in the groupchat. The campaign’s use of “Freedom” by Beyoncé is comparatively tame, predictable: focus group teflon, crowd pleasing and on-brand, nearly to the point of parody. With the election just a few short months away, this sort of populist messaging makes sense, an effort to connect and communicate with the widest swath of the electorate possible.
The Trump campaign’s invocation of rappers typically comes across as opportunistic, if unnervingly hip; its perceived success in courting rappers in 2024 seems primarily the result of a strategic shift targeting burgeoning rappers alongside the high-profile celebrities whose support Trump covets most. By comparison, Biden and Harris’s soft power maneuverings come across as more natural, spiritual successors to Barack Obama’s pop culture appeal.
E-40 and Queen Latifah performed at rallies for Biden this spring, while VP Harris has previously done panels on gun violence and marijuana policy with Quavo and Fat Joe; since her promotion to the top of the ticket, she's already notched social media support from Lil Nas X and Ariana Grande. And that's before we get into the campaign outreach efforts at music festivals and awards shows. Just this week, Megan thee Stallion threw her support behind Harris, performing at a rally in Atlanta.
These cosigns have felt far more on-message than any of Trump’s hip-hop linkups. Still, it’s hard to say politicians name checking rappers are doing anything except pandering, no matter who Kamala might have on her playlist. Considering Harris’s tough-on-crime record as a prosecutor, her attempts to prove she’s down with rap music could ring as hollow as Hillary Clinton’s dab on Ellen for a range of voters. On Tuesday night in Atlanta, Quavo came out to stump for the Vice President, citing her positions on gun reform. Harris returned the favor by saying Trump doesn’t “walk it like he talks it” … when it comes to border policy. The crowd roared so loud for the Migos reference you could almost forget its in service of a wildly xenophobic border policy that would have been extreme among Republicans just a decade ago.
But if this marketing is shallow, that might just be because these candidates aren’t all that deep to begin with. They’re so focused on reminding voters how bad their opponents are that they’ve forgotten to offer us a vision of the future. Sorely lacking for genuine political will and innovation, the 2024 presidential election has instead lapsed into a battle of vibes. Hoping to score a few extra aura points, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have “platformed” hip-hop the same way TikTok dissociates and disseminates song fragments, massaging choice excerpts into pleasantly anodyne goo. If the editing team does their job right, you could even watch them with the sound off.
