Russell Simmons has just announced his endorsement of Senator Barack Obama, but the hip-hop mogul did not always have kind words for the candidate.

“Obama’s leadership, passion and demand for a change resonates effectively with the aspirations of millions of people who want a better quality of life,” Mr. Simmons, co-founder of Def Jam Recordings, said in a statement.

But last year, Mr. Simmons criticized Mr. Obama, Democrat of Illinois, over the latter’s comments comparing Don Imus’s racially disparaging remark about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team to rappers’ lyrics.

“My response to Senator Obama is that you have to talk about the poverty and ignorance that creates such a climate that the poets can talk like that,” Mr. Simmons told ABC News in April. “And all the politicians owe them an education and an opportunity for a better life – and maybe they’ll say something better.”

Representing a different generation of Democratic support, Hugh L. Carey, a former governor of New York, is backing Mr. Obama, The Times reported today.