Ice Cube stands by work with the Trump administration: "Black progress is a bipartisan issue"
Ice Cube is under fire this week after Trump adviser Katrina Pierson tagged him on Twitter, thanking the “Fuck The Police” rapper for his “willingness to step up and work with [the Donald Trump] Administration to help develop the #PlatinumPlan.” What is the Platinum Plan? fans asked. And how could one of hip-hop’s most incendiary figures work with such a racist administration? Ice Cube addressed his critics on Wednesday, and he isn’t apologizing.
According to the rapper’s representative (via Rolling Stone), Ice Cube has been working to connect with both the Trump and Biden campaigns to chat about his Contract With Black America (CWBA), which “strikes at the heart of racism and presents a blueprint to achieve racial economic justice.” The CWBA, which calls for a “complete paradigm shift in how we run our institutions and operate our country,” addresses economic inequality, prison reform, and the elimination of all confederate monuments, among other subjects. Ice Cube has made mention of it in multiple videos posted to his socials, where he criticizes both parties and calls the CWBA “one of the most comprehensive reform documents that have come out in a long time that can really address the problem.”
In a tweet on Wednesday, Ice Cube revealed that both parties contacted him about the CWBA. “Dems said we’ll address the CWBA after the election,” he continued. “Trump campaign made some adjustments to their plan after talking to us about the CWBA.” Their plan is the aforementioned Platinum Plan.
The Platinum Plan, which you can learn more about here, promises to “increase access to capital in black communities by almost $500 billion” by boosting jobs and local businesses in Black communities and offering “better and tailored healthcare” and “access to better education and job training.”
Ice Cube, though, remains skeptical as to whether the Trump administration will actually deliver. Speaking of Republicans in an October 11 video, he said, “They’ve moved their agenda a lot because of what we’ve said. They put $500 billion on the table. But who knows what’s really gonna happen. I just know one of them is gonna win. And I don’t know if it really matters to us.”
“People say we can’t take another four years of this,” he goes on to say. “Black people, we can take anything. Shit.”
After a fan criticized him for “working with the Darkside,” he replied by saying “every side is the Darkside for us here in America,” adding that “we can’t afford not to negotiate with whoever is in power or our condition in this country will never change.”
He continued to defend his work with the Trump administration on Thursday, noting that he hasn’t endorsed anyone and that “Black progress is a bipartisan issue.”
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