Kanye West Responds to George Bush on the Today Show

Kanye West Responds to George Bush on the Today Show

Kanye West Today Show
Kanye West Today Show
Kanye West Today Show
Kanye West Interview on the Today Show Matt Lauer

Kayne West, he is not a stranger to controversy and he's back in the headlines this week

for his comments about former President, George W. Bush. We're going to hear from him in a moment,

but first, as we've mentioned, President Bush opens up in his new memoir

about that famous moment when West said, 'George Bush doesn't care about black people.'

It's something I asked President Bush about when we sat down recently in Texas.

I didn't appreciate it then and I don't appreciate it now. It's one thing to say,

you know, I don't appreciate the way he's handled his business. It's another thing to say

this man's a racist.

I resent it. It's not true. And it's one of the most disgusting moments of my presidency.

He was a two-term president who ran the country during Katrina, 9/11, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan

and the Financial Meltdown and he's pointing the finger at Kanye West

and that incident as one of the worst moment in his presidency.

I asked Kanye West to respond to President Bush's remarks.

As far as it being his worst moment of his presidency, ya'know, I can't really speak to that.

Ya'know, but his take, his explanation, I completely agree with and I empathize with totally.

And I've felt like that the entire time that, ya'know, I was being, ya'know, held as a hero

and everyone saying, 'ya'know, I'm so happy you said that' and 'I didn't like you before

but now I like you 'cuz you said this' and you just sit there and you know, in your heart

as a person that to, an emotion, ya'know, in a moment of emotion to peg someone or

to call a name, or peg someone as a racist is not, it's just not right.

Yeah, there was great frustration with the response to Hurricane Katrina and there we were standing there,

it was just a few days, less than a week afterward, but while most people

expressed frustration,you did take it across a line and you said you made it a little more sinister,

that the Federal response to Katrina was because of race. So, do you regret having said that now?

I - I - I don't wanna speak on the word regret and I think a lot of things that happen

in America, period, are because of race just the way this country was built

and the struggles we've had to have to get into, ya'know, positions, you know, through media,

through social positions, through gentrification - through like so many, it's a way bigger

conversation than that. But what I wanted to speak to with Bush was just to say that,

I empathize with the idea being pegged as a racist.

Just play that tape. Don't even listen this time, I want you to just look at his face -

All right.

When he is commenting about you and just look at him, I mean this is the most emotional

he got during my entire 3-1/2 hour interview with him.

What would you say to him if he would meet with you face to Face?

And I'm not sure he would but if he would?

You know, I mean I didn't need you guys to show me the tape in order to like, prompt my emotion to what

I'm going to say.

No, I'm just, I'm just asking you - when you look at his face. What would you say to him?

I mean, pre-looking at his face, I came up here 'cuz I wanted to say something

to him right after the fact. Ya'know, I would say, ya'know what I'm saying?

It's like, you don't have to do the TV stuff with me. This is reality, this is, this is the real thing

going on. This is, you know what I'm saying? I don't need all the jazz.

Um, I would say to, can we be quiet for second?

Um, I would tell George Bush, um, in my moment of frustration that I didn't have the grounds

to call him a racist.

And you're sorry.

Yeah, I'm sorry for -

I think I get the point.

I want to give it the exact perfect wording because everything that I say gets taken

and drawn into headlines and - I'm here to man-up to different mistakes, that I've made and speak

to the, ya'know, the moment that I pegged George Bush as a racist.

I came here to say, that I've made mistakes, that I've grown as a person and it's not as easy

as boxing someone into a villain role or into a race role. I did not have the information,

enough information in that situation to call him a racist. That might have been the emotion

that I felt but me being a rational, well-thought out, empathetic human being

and thinking about it after the fact, I would have chosen different words.

Even in these times where I was considered to have done something so wrong,

my motivation was from a good place - maybe mistimed, maybe not the right wording, not using

or realizing the power of my words and the way they would stop the Internet but nonetheless,

that it's very pure and from a good place.

So, it sounds to me and not to oversimplify it, but what you are saying,

we are human, we make mistakes, but - we have to learn from our mistakes.

Yeah.

And during the interview Kanye West also told me that he empathized with President Bush

because he, too, talking about Kanye here, was called a racist when he interrupted

Taylor Swift at the 2009 MTV Music Awards. As we often do on Today, we role video of that moment

during his answer. We're going to show you his reaction in a moment.

But after our interview Kanye fired off several tweets including this one:

Here's the moment Kanye is talking about.

We're alluding to when you walked onto the VMAs and grabbed the mike

from Taylor Swift and some people said, this wasn't a guy expressing his musical preference,

this was a guy who was making a statement about race - that Beyonce was better

than Taylor Swift, and you got accused of racism.

Yeah, exactly and I just - it was so funny to me that it could be a race thing because what I was

expressing was my frustration from years and years of seeing, ya'know -

Yo, how am I supposed to talk if you are going to run this thing in the middle while I'm talking?

It's just, it's under, you won't be hearing much.

but I'm hearing it while I'm trying to talk.

OK, can you take the sound out of the overheads, please? Just pick up - you said it wasn't a race thing.

Please don't let that happen again, it's like ridiculous.

Ya'know, it's something we do everyday when a guest is talking about an incident or a location -

we run video of that location or that incident. Um, there was nothing improper about it, nothing

unusual about it,

Right, that's very common.

- whatsoever. Um, and we should mention that President Bush was here on Wednesday,

he said he appreciated West's apology. So, that's what all the hub-bub is about.

OK. doesn't seem like much, but -

And we look forward to Kanye's return for a special live concert on the plaza,

Friday November 26th. That is the day after Thanksgiving.