John Legend is clearing the air about his strained relationship with Kanye West.
The "All of Me" singer, 43, clarified what really caused a rift in his close friendship with the Donda rapper, who was a vocal supporter of Donald Trump before deciding to run against him and Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.
"What it got described as was, we stopped being friends because he supported Trump, which was a mischaracterization of what I said," Legend explained during an interview with the New Yorker published Sept. 4. "That was kind of the Rupert Murdoch version of the story—it was all over the New York Post and Fox News."
Legend stated that what actually happened was West got upset when the Oscar winner did not support him when he ran for president, adding, "that was the real impetus for us having a strain in our friendship."
"I don't know what will happen in the future, but he was very upset with me that I didn't support him and I supported Joe Biden," he continued. "It's up to him whether he can get past that."
Legend also opened up about the time West shared screenshots of their text message conversations online, when he spoke to the "Gold Digger" rapper about trying to get him to reconsider supporting Trump in 2018.
"Everyone saw how I talked to him about it," the singer told the New Yorker. "I talked to him with love and with empathy and tried to help him see another way of looking at things. And obviously he went the way he went with it."
Legend shared that "the most frustrating thing" about West's run for presidency was the fact that he believes it "was an operation run by the Trump campaign."
"I don't know how aware he was of the fact that there was so much Trump personnel throughout his campaign, raising money for him, getting petitions signed for him, getting him on the ballot," he continued. "I saw their work on his behalf as a clear scam and an operation to try to siphon Black votes away from Biden, so there was no way I was going to support it. Kanye was upset with that, and we haven't been friends since, really."
While Legend noted that he doesn't believe politics should affect your relationships with people, he said that he does think "that certain things you believe in are indicators of your character, and obviously that will affect your friendships."
"I don't want to live a life that's so consumed by politics that it's the sole determinant of who can be my friend and who can't," he added. "But values matter and character matters and moral compass matters."