The GOP’S rainbow coalition

You could say Kanye West didn’t have a great night on Tuesday. His presidential campaign came to an expected, anticlimactic end. As a presidential candidate, he was mostly irrelevant. But, as an artist and activist, West may have had the best night of his career.

Tuesday’s election affirmed the very crusade that brought him into politics, donning a red hat. West aspired to prove minority communities are not a monolith. The Chicago rapper was willing to take the hits to prove his point. As West told Jimmy Kimmel, “Liberals can’t bully me, news can’t bully me, the hip- hop community, they can’t bully me.”

A surprisingly large number of voters from Black and Hispanic communities proved on Tuesday night that West was not alone. Few actually voted for him, but they did vote for Republicans. In casting a vote for a political party with Donald Trump’s name at the top of the ballot, this fraction of Black and Hispanic voters have delivered the same message to liberals, journalists and entertainers: respect our individuality.