Touré does not believe House Majority Leader Eric Cantor when he says he likes Wiz Khalifa, the MSNBC commentator said Tuesday in a dedicated segment on the listening choices of Sen. Marco Rubio and Cantor:
TOURE: But nonetheless, the controversy that can come with embracing the music; we saw a lot of people on the right try to go after the president after Common went to the White House to perform. They started bringing up lyrics from other songs; they even tried to paint one of the most socially conscious rappers alive as a gangster rappers.
TAMRON HALL: Yeah, one of the nicest guys in hip-hop. Yeah, this is sort of the silly season with Republicans where just anything that a Democrat will say, they’ll find some reason—you know, next they’ll say Common once ate dog-meat as a child. That’s just silly. But let’s talk about Cantor and Rubio, if we might.
HALL: That's why we showed them.
TOURE: I don't believe for a second that Eric Cantor is really digging Wiz Khalifa and the Snowman—Young Jeezy—who is all about cocaine rap.
HALL: That's not the only thing--I’m not going on defend him—but that is not the only thing he’s about.
TOURE: Do you think it is love songs? This is the Snowman. Rubio says he likes Nicki Minaj, which I find interesting, I believe that. I liked the way he seemed to get a little embarrassed in admitting it. It made me think, like, this is real. It’s not a political gesture or strategy—he really likes her. She makes pop music, I can understand why he might like her.
HALL: But what I did not understand was, he refers to Pitbull as a local artist.
TOURE: Well, he is a local guy.
HALL: He’s not local anymore.
TOURE: Well, he is a global star, but he is from Miami.
HALL: We're all from somewhere.
TOURE: Not really hip-hop. But, I mean, like, glad that he supports Pitbull. That sounds fine, whatever.
HALL: To the core of the question, does the hip-hop strategy working in the case of a Marco Rubio, or even in the case of an Eric Cantor, how does that help them attempt to look cool or does it backfire?
TOURE: I think that it does make Rubio look a little bit cooler—a little man of the people that he does listen to the people that the people listen to. It seem to fit what he is talking about and it seemed to me a bit of honesty in what he was saying there. Cantor, I think it might back fire because it just doesn't make sense to me.
HALL: You're judging him based on what? What make you feel that he can't listen to Wiz Khalifa? "Black and Yellow"? How many sports fans have listened to that? It's not as if he is super hard core.
TOURE: There is no can’t in it. But, you know, does it feel honest? Does it feel like he really listens to those people? Or is he saying something that he kind of knows--are you really a fan? I believe when the president says he is really a Jay-Z fan, I believe that. Lil’ Wayne? Nas? I believe that. I just don't believe Eric Cantor.
A heated exchange on air and on Twitter between Touré and CNN host Piers Morgan earlier this month drew attention to Touré's 2009 defense of 9/11 Truther and former green jobs czar Van Jones, and additional comments made by Touré questioning the events of 9/11:
It now appears that Touré, an MSNBC contributor, is a 9/11 conspiracy crank. Writing after Van Jones, the former White House green jobs czar, was fired in 2009, Touré took to Twitter to defend Jones’s outlandish statements with some of his own.
On Sept. 7, 2009, Touré sent the following tweets about the incident.