Kanye West Acquires Right Wing Social Media Site Parler After Being Kicked Off Twitter & Instagram

Donald Trump has Truth Social. Elon Musk is astir to bargain Twitter (maybe). Now, Kanye “Ye” West will ain Parler. In the latest installment of arguable men buying societal media bullhorns, Ye, 45, announced connected Monday (Oct. 17) that helium has agreed successful rule to bargain the right-wing societal media platform. The deal’s fiscal presumption weren’t disclosed, though the genitor company, Parlement Technologies, announced successful September that it had raised $56 cardinal successful backing to date. “In a satellite wherever blimpish opinions are considered to beryllium controversial, we person to marque definite we person the close to freely explicit ourselves,” Ye said successful a statement, per CNBC.

Ye’s Parler acquisition comes connected the heels of his societal media suspension implicit a slew of antisemitism. Ye’s Instagram relationship was restricted connected Oct. 8 aft helium shared a speech betwixt him and Sean “Diddy” Combs. In the convo, Ye told Diddy that helium was going “to usage you arsenic an illustration to amusement the Jewish radical that told you to telephone maine that nary 1 tin endanger oregon power me.” After getting his IG restricted, Ye returned to Twitter, but the homecoming was short-lived. The app locked his relationship aft Ye tweeted helium was going “death [sic] con 3 connected JEWISH PEOPLE.”

Kanye ‘Ye’ West announced connected Oct. 17 that helium was buying Parler (Shutterstock)

At its peak, Parler had 2.9 cardinal regular users, per CNN. However, with the emergence of competing blimpish platforms, including Trump’s Truth Social, CNN reports that the regular idiosyncratic number has dropped to astir 40,000 (Twitter has 237 cardinal regular progressive users.)

Parler was launched successful 2018 and was embroiled successful contention implicit its relation successful the January 6 insurrection. Amazon, Apple, and Google removed Parler from their stores pursuing the alleged coup. Apple reinstated it successful May 2021, per The Verge. In September 2022, Google allowed it backmost connected the Google Play store, seemingly agreeing to comply with the further moderation measures that got it backmost connected the iOS store.

Kanye successful October 2022, weeks earlier helium would denote his acquisition of Parler (Shutterstock)

Parlement Technologies and Ye expect to finalize the woody astatine the extremity of the year. “Ye is making a groundbreaking determination into the escaped code media abstraction and volition ne'er person to fearfulness being removed from societal media again,” said George Farmer, Parlement Technologies CEO. “Once again, Ye proves that helium is 1 measurement up of the bequest media narrative. Parlement volition beryllium honored to assistance him execute his goals.”

Farmer is joined to Candace Owens, the right-wing commentator who was by Ye’s broadside during his now-infamous “White Lives Matter” manner show. Ye besides attended the premiere of Owens’ documentary, The Greatest Lie Ever Sold. Farmer was named CEO of Parler successful May 2021 pursuing a quality betwixt capitalist Rebekah Mercer and ex-Parler main John Matze. Mercer is the heiress girl of hedge money billionaire Robert Mercer and Parler’s controlling shareholder.