Cast your mind back, if you can, to the bygone days of early October — Oct. 6 to be exact.
It was a different time. A simpler time, if that were somehow possible.
Ye, aka Kanye West, was set to appear on Fox News with Tucker Carlson to discuss his decision to wear a “White Lives Matter” shirt at Paris Fashion Week.
Elon Musk had just reversed himself and decided to avoid litigation by proceeding after all with buying Twitter at the ridiculous price he’d first proposed, having also promised to lift the permanent ban on Donald Trump.
And Trump was, I don’t know, sitting by the pool at Mar-a-Lago looking forward to the midterm elections a month away in which his fellow Republicans were expected to coast to an easy victory.
Evidently feeling confident that everything was coming up red, GOP members of the House Judiciary Committee opened Twitter and cranked out this classic: “Kanye. Elon. Trump.”
The gist of the tweet was simple. Conservatives were cool again. And rich. And proud of it!
Ye's antisemitism isn’t new, so if you have a personal experience or story regarding his comments and behavior, learn how to contact us securely here.
What the tweet’s author (most likely Rep. Jim Jordan, the Trump ally with a habit for tweeting and the ranking Republican on that committee) didn’t seem to appreciate was that this tweet was the Twitter equivalent of the videotape from The Ring (2002), and if it mentioned you, your reputation would begin to nosedive within seven days.
Flash forward to Dec. 1, and the tweet has finally been put out of its misery.
The deletion came after Ye appeared with Sandy Hook conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and publicly praised Adolf Hitler, adding that he likes the Nazi leader.
After two months of cascading nightmares for each of the three men in the tweet, Ye saying he was a fan of Nazis is what finally caused the tweet to be deleted.
RIP to a real (chaotic) one.
But as a recap, let’s check all the things that happened after the tweet was posted that evidently didn’t merit its deletion.
For Ye:
- Ye was suspended from social media platforms after tweeting about going “death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE” and implying Sean "Diddy" Combs was being controlled by Jews.
- Unaired footage leaked from Ye’s interview with Carlson in which he made further antisemitic comments and other deeply bizarre claims.
- An episode of The Shop was pulled because Ye used his appearance to “reiterate more hate speech and extremely dangerous stereotypes,” according to Maverick Carter, the CEO of the company behind the talk show.
- Ye appeared on Drink Champs and falsely claimed George Floyd died from a fentanyl overdose, rather than at the hands of former police officer Derek Chauvin. The interview was later pulled from YouTube, and Floyd’s family said they would sue the rapper.
- Fashion label Balenciaga cut ties with Ye.
- Vogue magazine severed ties with Ye.
- Talent agency CAA dumped Ye.
- A group of neo-Nazis held a sign over a Los Angeles freeway that read, “Kanye is right about the Jews.”
- Ex-wife Kim Kardashian condemned hate speech and antisemitism.
- Adidas ended its partnership with Ye, taking a $246 million hit.
- CNN reported Ye had an “obsession” with Hitler.
- Adidas launched an investigation into a report that Ye used to show pornography and intimate photos of his former wife to employees.
For Musk:
- Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter was finally completed.
- Musk celebrated his purchase by sharing (and later deleting) an unfounded conspiracy theory about the attack on Nancy Pelosi’s husband.
- Half of Twitter’s 7,500 employees were laid off in chaotic fashion. Some were let go by mistake and asked to return.
- Musk’s new Twitter Blue service rolled out and handed out “blue checks” to paying users without any actual ID verification, meaning mass chaos soon broke out with people pretending to be brands, officials, and even Musk himself. The new service was soon paused.
- About 1,200 of the remaining 3,700 full-time employees opted for a buyout rather than continue to work for Musk. Some of those who left worked on key teams that kept the site running, leading to fears the whole website would soon crash.
- Musk was forced to sell almost $4 billion in Tesla stock.
- Musk reinstated Trump’s account, which was banned after the Capitol attack, after running a poll on Twitter (which he previously said was overrun with bots).
- Musk reinstated Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s personal account, which had been banned after repeatedly spreading COVID misinformation.
- Musk fired dozens of developers the night before Thanksgiving.
- Musk announced an amnesty for accounts that had been previously suspended, which at least one academic described as “like opening the gates of hell in terms of the havoc it will cause."
- Musk lifted Twitter’s ban on COVID misinformation.
- Twitter began banning left-wing accounts after false reports of abuse from far-right users.
- Advertisers fled Twitter amid a decline in content moderation, decimating revenue.
For Trump:
- The Jan. 6 Committee subpoenaed Trump over the attack on the Capitol.
- A federal judge said there was evidence Trump had signed and filed court documents that he knew contained false information as part of his scheme to overturn his loss in the 2020 presidential election.
- Trump’s endorsed candidates in Arizona, Pennsylvania, Nevada, and Georgia failed to win election at the midterms, with Democrats defying predictions by taking the Senate.
- Republicans and conservative media began rallying around Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis as the future of the party, prompting a public meltdown from Trump.
- Trump announced he was running for president again at an event that was dubbed “low energy” by those who had worked in his administration.
- Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel to decide whether to charge Trump with crimes connected with his handling of classified documents, attempts to overturn the election, or the assault on the Capitol.
- Republicans began blasting Trump for his decision to dine with — who else? — Ye at Mar-a-Lago when the openly antisemitic rapper brought along an openly white nationalist agitator.
Phew.
I’m exhausted just compiling that list. I can’t imagine how tired that poor tweet was trying to soldier on.
Glad it’s finally at peace.