Local hip-hop artist J. Suarez believes presidential candidates “clout chasing” with popular rappers to be fake, except in president Obama’s case.

“It means buttering up to advance one’s cause,” J. Suarez said, “now the presidential candidates are clout chasin’ with hip-hop artists to sway our votes.”

J. Suarez is a south San Diego hip-hop dancer and painter. “I’m not voting this time around. I don’t know if my vote will really make a difference. Ninety percent of politicians only do things for folks with better incomes.”

On October 21, President Donald Trump posted a photo of the New York Post newspaper headlined “50 Cent says ‘I don’t want to be 20 Cent’ under Biden tax plan.”

A day before, 50 Cent, a rapper turned entrepreneur and television producer who is registered to vote under his real name Curtis James Jackson III, posted a screenshot of a televised news report that reads in part “Top tax rates by state under Biden Tax Plan — California 62.6 percent… New York City 62 percent.” 50 Cent then captioned the screenshot, stating in part: “WHAT THE FUCK! (VOTE For TRUMP) IM OUT, FUCK NEW YORK …. I don’t care [if] Trump doesn’t like black people …. 62 percent[,] are you out of ya fucking mind.”

In 2020, the 44-year-old “Poor Lil Rich” rapper from Queens is reportedly worth about $30 million. In 2014, Forbes reported he was clocking in at $155 million.

Rapper and English teacher Nate “KnewBalance” Whitsell is voting for Biden/Harris via mail-in ballot and “dropping it off at my official ballot drop-off here in Ocean Beach. As far as 50 and anyone else zeroed in on financial prosperity as the number one marker for who to vote for, I will refer to the New Testament scripture that states 'the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.'”

“I believe President Trump cares for the American people, and I want my kids to grow up in a safe country with conservative morals,” said Danielle a local college student and hip-hop fan who listens to Kendrick Lamar and rapper turned 2020 presidential nominee Kanye West. “I am voting for President Trump because he has made the economy the most successful it’s ever been: record low unemployment, taxes have been cut, businesses are no longer offshoring, families were succeeding like never before. The economy is only hurting right now due to governors shutting down their states due to COVID-19. President Trump has brought back the American spirit, and the people now want to fight to keep the American dream alive.”

• Until you rest in peace
• you should restlessly
• and seemingly endlessly
• chase want, not necessity,
• the American dream
• won’t get the best of me…”

That’s part of Whitsell’s verse from the “Dead Precedents,” a track he produced with his brother-in-law PAZ1 as The Piecemakers. “It is paramount to pay reparations and to provide financial/economic equity,” Whitsell said, “and not just a shallow sense of equality to Black Americans (and to American Indians), so money matters. I just don’t think it’s the most important issue to base your vote on.”

While Suarez opines that former President Obama clout chased with rappers Jay Z, Common, and Kendrick Lamar, Whitsell disagrees. “As a teacher and a dad, I have honed and learned to really trust my intuition/vibe-reader, and Obama and these artists seemed to actually connect.”

The presidential/hip-hop connection goes way back. It even predates Eric B. & Rakim’s 1986 “Eric B. is President” rap song.

Around 1983, Suarez breakdanced to Project Future’s electro-funk song titled Ray-Gun-Nomics, a wordplay on Reaganomics. “Then in ’84 or ’85, President Ronald Reagan invited the New York City Breakers to breakdance at his inaugural ball after he beat out Mondale,” Suarez said. “And around the same time, former First Lady Nancy Reagan was on CNN breakin’ to some old-school hip-hop.”

“[I] don’t think that was clout chasin’, they already won the election.”