In an address designed to promote Democratic candidate Kamala Harris, former US President Barack Obama delivered what is now considered his most animated speech to date.
His impassioned defence of Harris represents a shift from his usual reserve – as was the case, for instance, when Joe Biden was running for presidency.
Beyond lauding Harris’s qualities, his most salient comments were those in which he attacked Trump – “a guy whose act has — let’s face it — gotten pretty stale”.
He criticized Donald Trump’s “childish nicknames and crazy conspiracy theories and weird obsession with crowd size”, while holding his hands a few inches apart in innuendo – a spontaneous move which gave TV hosts a field day.
“Going small is petty, it’s unhealthy, and, quite frankly, it’s unpresidential”, Michelle Obama said, apparently unaware of the irony of the double-entendre. “It’s his same old con: doubling down on ugly, misogynistic, racist lies as a substitute for real ideas and solutions that will actually make people’s lives better.”
Obama called Trump “a 78-year-old billionaire who hasn’t stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago”.
“The other day, I heard someone compare Trump to the neighbor who keeps running his leaf blower outside your window every minute of every day”, Obama mused. Harris, however, he says is “not the neighbor running the leaf blower — she’s the neighbor rushing over to help when you need a hand”.
Michelle Obama continued to follow in her husband’s suit with this approach, despite her famous “When they go low, we go high” affirmation.
“Who’s going to tell him that the job he’s currently seeking might just be one of those black jobs?”, Michelle Obama derided Trump, causing peals of laughter in the audience.
At Trump’s own rally, he responded to the Obamas’ derision in the same note: “Did you see Barack Hussein Obama last night taking little shots? He was taking shots at your president, and so was Michelle. You know they always say, ‘Sir, please stick to policy. Don’t get personal.’ And yet they’re getting personal all night long.”
Meanwhile, Tim Walz has been calling Trump “weird” in repeated contexts.
In 2016, Obama publicly supported Hillary Clinton and thereafter expressed a reserved support of Joe Biden.
