Kim Kardashian Recalls Fire Evacuation, Kanye’s ‘Empathy’ Plea to Trump in Exclusive Interview

By Marc Malkin

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Kanye West may have said he’s distancing himself from politics, but that doesn’t mean he’s no longer in contact with the White House.

Kim Kardashian West tells Variety that her husband reached out to officials about Pres. Donald Trump’s controversial tweet blaming the California wildfires on forestry mismanagement .

“When he doesn’t agree with something like that fire comment he will screengrab [and] he will send it to the people close to [Trump] and say that maybe there should be a little more empathy in this,” Kardashian West said before her panel with CNN’s Van Jones at Variety and Rolling Stone’s Criminal Justice Reform Summit at the Jeremy West Hollywood hotel.

Just last month, West announced that he was distancing himself from politics following a storm of backlash after he praised President Trump in a series of tweets. “My eyes are now wide open and (I) now realize I’ve been used to spread messages I don’t believe in,” the rapper wrote. “I am distancing myself from politics and completely focusing on being creative!!!”

The famous couple fled their home shortly after the began late last week.

After evacuating her home, Kardashian West posted on Instagram, writing, “Pray for Calabasas, Just landed back home and had 1 hour to pack up & evacuate our home. I pray everyone is safe.” She later tweeted an update explaining that although the flames had reached her property, they had since become more contained.”

Kardashian West told Variety that with just an hour to evacuate, they grabbed their computers and a hard drive containing digital files of their photo albums and videos as well as “my kids’ blankets, my childhood blanket that my grandma made me, things that you can’t really replace.”

“All the other stuff doesn’t really matter,” she added.

While evacuation orders have slowly been lifted, Kardashian West said they haven’t returned home just yet. “It’s smoky and my son has a little bit of asthma so it’s not really safe for him to go back,” she explained.

also tweeted about the fires, offering his support to those who lost their homes and praising firefighters and first responders for risking their lives while trying to help.