On Saturday, former First Lady Michelle Obama ripped the crowd that attended President Trump’s 2017 inauguration, snapping that they were “not reflective of the country.”
Speaking at the Essence Festival in New Orleans with CNN host Gayle King, Michelle Obama stated, “And then we had to meet the Trumps. That day was very emotional and then to sit at that inauguration and to look around at a crowd that was not reflective of the country, and I had to sit in that audience, one of a handful of people of color, and then listen to that speech, all that I had sort of held on to for eight years, watching my husband get raked over the coals, feeling like we had to do everything perfectly, so by the time I got on that plane, it was release of eight years of having to try to show up, as we all know we have to do, not only perfectly but a little bit better than perfect to even be considered equal.”
Asked about what it was like campaigning with her husband, Michelle Obama said Americans tried to “take me out by the knees,” claiming, “For a minute there, I was an angry black woman who was emasculating her husband. As I got more popular, that’s when people of all sides — Democrats and Republicans — tried to take me out by the knees and the best way to do it was to focus on the one thing people were afraid of: the strength of a black woman.”
Obama consoled the audience by asserting, “Don’t be upset over our legacy; me and Barack are cool, y’know. What we have to be really conscientious of is what kind of country are we leaving for our children and our grandchildren.”
One month after Trump was elected, Michelle Obama posited that Trump’s election portended hopelessness in America, opining, “We feel the difference now. See, now, we are feeling what not having hope feels like. Hope is necessary. It’s a necessary concept and Barack didn’t just talk about hope because he thought it was just a nice slogan to get votes. He and I and so many believe that — what else do you have if you don’t have hope. What do you give your kids if you can’t give them hope?”
The next day, Trump fired back, asserting, “Michelle Obama said yesterday that there’s no hope. But I assume she was talking about the past, not the future… Because I’m telling you, we have tremendous hope, and we have tremendous promise and tremendous potential. We are going to be so successful as a country again. We are going to be amazing.”
In April 2018, Michelle Obama told an audience that her husband’s administration was like “having the ‘good parent’ at home — the responsible parent, the one who told you to eat your carrots and go to bed on time,” then mocked President Trump’s by saying, “And now we have the other parent. We thought it’d feel fun — maybe it feels fun for now because we can eat candy all day and stay up late and not follow the rules.”