It feels like a lifetime ago, but remember when Kanye West—now officially known as Ye—actually ran for President of the United States? It wasn’t just a tweet. It wasn't just a late-night rant. He actually got people to show up at polling stations and bubble in his name. If you've ever wondered exactly how many votes did kanye get for president, you aren't alone. People still argue about whether he was a "spoiler" candidate or just a guy with a very expensive hobby.
Honestly, the numbers are both higher and lower than you’d expect.
The Final Count: How Many Votes Did Kanye Get For President?
Let’s get the hard data out of the way first. In the 2020 General Election, Kanye West received approximately 66,000 to 70,000 votes across the United States. To be precise, official tallies often land on 67,906 popular votes.
That might sound like a lot of people—enough to fill a massive football stadium—but in the grand scheme of a US election, it’s a tiny drop in a very large bucket. We are talking about 0.04% of the total vote share. For comparison, Joe Biden and Donald Trump both pulled in over 70 million votes each.
Ye was running under the "Birthday Party." Why? Because he said, "When we win, it's everybody's birthday."
Classic Kanye.
Where did those votes actually come from?
He didn't even make it onto the ballot in most states. He missed deadlines, filed paperwork late, and dealt with a mountain of legal challenges. In the end, he was only an official option in 12 states.
Tennessee was his biggest stronghold.
People in the Volunteer State showed up for him more than anywhere else, giving him over 10,000 votes.
Here is a quick look at his performance in the states where he actually appeared on the ballot:
- Tennessee: 10,216 votes
- Minnesota: 7,748 votes
- Kentucky: 6,259 votes
- Colorado: 6,003 votes
- Oklahoma: 5,590 votes
- Louisiana: 4,894 votes
- Utah: 4,311 votes
- Arkansas: 4,040 votes
- Idaho: 3,631 votes
- Iowa: 3,197 votes
- Mississippi: 3,117 votes
- Vermont: 1,269 votes
In Vermont, he actually managed to pull 0.3% of the total vote. That was his "peak" percentage-wise.
The 2024 "Campaign" That Wasn't
After conceding in 2020 with a tweet that simply said "KANYE 2024," a lot of people expected a massive sequel. But life got messy. Between the high-profile divorce, the corporate fallouts, and the controversial statements that made headlines for all the wrong reasons, the 2024 run never really materialized in the way the first one did.
There were filings. There were some "Ye 24" hoodies. But by the time the 2024 election cycle really heated up, he had largely stepped back from the political ring. If you are looking for 2024 stats, there basically aren't any official ones because he wasn't a certified candidate on the scale he was in 2020. He stayed off the ballots.
Why the Numbers Mattered (or Didn't)
A lot of political analysts were terrified of Kanye's run early on. They thought he would syphon off young voters or Black voters from the Democratic platform.
It didn't happen.
Most voters viewed it as a "protest vote" or a meme. According to data from the Federal Election Commission (FEC), Kanye’s campaign spent roughly $13.2 million. If you do the math—dividing $13.2 million by roughly 67,000 votes—Kanye spent about **$197 per vote**.
That is an incredibly expensive way to get 1,200 votes in Vermont.
The Write-In Factor
It is also worth noting that Kanye urged fans to write him in in states where he wasn't on the ballot. This makes the question of how many votes did kanye get for president a bit fuzzy. While 67,000 is the official "ballot" number, thousands of other people likely scribbled "Kanye West" or "Ye" on their ballots in states like New York or California. Most of those aren't counted individually in national totals unless the write-in candidate has officially registered as one in that specific state.
What can we learn from the "Birthday Party"?
The whole saga was a fascinating, if somewhat chaotic, look at how difficult it is for a third-party candidate to actually make a dent in the American system. Even with 100% name recognition and millions of dollars in the bank, you can't just "show up" to the presidency.
Logistics matter. Deadlines matter.
If you're curious about third-party movements, look at the historical data for candidates like Ross Perot or even Jo Jorgensen (who got nearly 1.9 million votes in 2020). It puts Kanye’s 67,000 into perspective.
He was a cultural titan, but a political footnote.
If you want to dig deeper into the actual paperwork of the campaign, you can head over to the FEC.gov candidate search and look up "KANYE 2020." It’s all there: the loans, the donor names (mostly small-dollar fans), and the millions spent on consultants. It is a wild read for anyone into the business side of politics.
Check your local state's Secretary of State website if you want to see if your specific county had any "Ye" write-ins—some of those local reports are surprisingly detailed.