Rapper Kanye West will have lunch on Thursday with President Donald Trump and Jared Kushner at the White House, the administration announced Tuesday.
In a statement, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said West, Trump and Kushner, the president's son-in-law and senior adviser, will discuss topics including "manufacturing resurgence in America, prison reform, how to prevent gang violence, and what can be done to reduce violence in Chicago." West was raised in Chicago.
News of West's planned visit was first reported by The New York Times.
West has repeatedly expressed support for Trump during his presidency, drawing backlash as a result. West has said that he didn't vote in 2016, but if he had, he would have voted for Trump, and he met with Trump during his presidential transition.
Last month, West sported a "Make America Great Again" hat as he delivered an off-air politically themed rant to an uncomfortable audience after the taping of the Sept. 29 season premiere of "SNL." During the speech, West defended Trump and claimed to be his "real" self, boasting that he had not taken what many presumed to be his psychiatric medication.
In May, Trump met with West's wife, Kim Kardashian West, about criminal sentencing reform. During the meeting, Kardashian West pushed Trump to commute the sentence of Alice Marie Johnson, a first-time offender who was sentenced to life in prison in Tennessee in 1996 for her involvement in a drug conspiracy. The president commuted her sentence in June.
Kardashian West has since given the White House reports on several other nonviolent criminal offenders for possible commutation.
