Kanye West Agrees to Buy Conservative Social Media Company Parler

Kanye West is following in the digital footsteps of Elon Musk and Donald Trump -- buying his own social media company to speak his mind ... one that leans in his direction, politically.

The rapper/producer just agreed to buy Parler -- a one-time defunct conservative platform similar to Twitter, which got yanked offline early last year and removed from a ton of apps ... including Apple, Google and Amazon.

Since then, it's been fighting to make a comeback, and Ye's stepping up to do just that.

He says, "In a world where conservative opinions are considered to be controversial we have to make sure we have the right to freely express ourselves."

Parler, for its part, said it was a "groundbreaking move into the free speech media space and will never have to fear being removed from social media again."

The terms of the purchase haven't been disclosed, and Parler notes it still has to go into a formal contract with Kanye that it expects to execute in the fourth quarter. It'd been reported Parler had raised upwards of $56 million in funding to get the site back up.

Parler was first pulled down because internet provider services claimed it wasn't doing enough to prevent hate speech and potential violence from fomenting on its pages. Likewise, KW was also recently frozen out of both Twitter and Instagram for antisemitic remarks ... among other public attacks, not to mention his "White Lives Matter" statements.

We should note ... Ye's new BFF, Candace Owens, may have facilitated things. Her hubby, George Farmer, is Parler's CEO -- although, presumably, he'd take a back seat to Kanye if this goes through.