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The Schmooze

Kanye West Takes Back ‘Ignorant Compliment’

Kanye West told a Chicago radio station that he wants to take back the “ignorant compliment” he made about Jews.

The rapper referred to a comment he made last month during an interview on the New York City radio station WWPR-FM. In defending President Obama’s difficulty in passing his policies, West said, “Black people don’t have the same level of connections as Jewish people.”

“I thought that I was giving a compliment, but it came off more ignorant,” West said last week in an interview with the Chicago radio station B96. “When I said this comment about Jews having money, and blacks not having money, I think it was, like, a ‘ignorant compliment.’

“I don’t know how being told that you have money is, like, an insult,” he added.

The original comments had raised the ire of the Anti-Defamation League, while Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan defended West and said he should not apologize.

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