Earlier this week, 2017 ESSENCE Festival headliner Chance the Rapper stopped by to chat with the ladies of The View ahead of his upcoming tour stop in NYC and as you might imagine, he completely wowed both the hosts and the audience.
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Among the topics discussed during Chance’s visit, the proud father and Grammy Award-winning entertainer touched on one of the motives behind the remarkable work he’s recently been doing to increase funding for the Chicago Public School System. “With the schools thing, that’s like the biggest topic in the city,” Chance told the panel. “I’m a new parent and I want my daughter to be CPS kid and if there’s no more CPS, then how’s that gonna happen? So, you know, I’m trying to play my part. We’ve raised over 2.2 million dollars so far.”
The Chicago native also opened up about how his family’s long-running history of activism in politics and civil rights has inspired him to use his own platform to take action towards bringing about change in the Black community. “With social activism as a whole, I just grew up with strong figures in my family. The women in my family….you know, my great-grandmother marched for [Dr. Martin Luther] King, my grandmother volunteered herself and all her kids to work for [former Chicago Mayor] Harold Washington’s campaign when they had no money. I just came from a lot of women and men in my family who are just leaders and feel some type of calling. My dad, he worked for Barack Obama. So, I think there’s just always been a calling to, if there’s something wrong in the world, to try to put some type of dent in it.”
Chance also gave his thoughts on LeBron James’ L.A. home being targeted with racist graffiti, why he looks up to Justin Bieber and Dave Chapelle and who he thinks is the greatest living artist of today. Check out his full interview on The View above and then be sure to grab your tickets to see Chance light up the stage, alongside more of the biggest names in music, at the 2017 ESSENCE Festival in New Orleans this July.
